


Through A Child's Eyes, It's Different

by rebelmeg, Sadekuuro



Series: Rebelmeg's TSB Fills 2020 [13]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Angst, BAMF Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Consequences, Depression, Developing Friendships, Dubious Science, F/M, Gen, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Kid Tony Stark, Kidnapping, Magic and Science, Minor Jane Foster/Thor, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sam Wilson Is a Good Bro, Team Cap Critical, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Whump, Working towards forgiveness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:15:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 33
Words: 57,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebelmeg/pseuds/rebelmeg, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro/pseuds/Sadekuuro
Summary: The Accords debacle is long over, and the ex-Avengers have come home.  Things are not going well, particularly when Tony gets kidnapped by the villain-of-the-week and ends up in the middle of a freak lab accident.Seeing things through the eyes of a child sounds kind of poetic, and in some cases, it is.  But for the rogue Avengers, it's a shocking and harsh look at their past deeds, as well as a closer look at who Tony Stark really is when he doesn't have all his self-made masks up to protect him.With Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy there to keep him safe and love him, Tony navigates the weirdness his life has become, while Dr. Strange, Thor, and Dr. Foster work to figure out what happened to Tony and if the deaging can be reversed.
Relationships: Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Tony Stark & Avengers Team
Series: Rebelmeg's TSB Fills 2020 [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1591063
Comments: 459
Kudos: 547
Collections: Fics that make my heart go OOF with fluff, ellie marvel fics - read





	1. A Cold Welcome Home

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the angst and fluff fest that is my 2020 Iron Man Big Bang fic! First of all, check those tags, and keep in mind that while this is not Team Cap hate, it is EXTREMELY Team Cap critical, coming from the viewpoint that they were wrong. If that's not something you like or can handle, this fic is not for you, because it's a main plot point that we'll be visiting a great deal.
> 
> Secondly, I hope you've braced yourself for that tooth-rotting fluff, because WOW. And just wait til you see the art! I screamed! I am so very lucky that Nat was my artist for this IMBB, and I am BEYOND THRILLED to have worked with her!
> 
> Thirdly, I do very much hope you enjoy the fic! It's the longest fic I've ever written, and I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out. It's a roller coaster of emotions, so keep some tissues handy, and keep your arms and legs inside the ride at all times. *Mwah*

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony learns the rest of the devastating details surrounding what happened in Siberia, and two years later he comes face to face with the people that he used to consider family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter crosses off my Pepperony Bingo square G3 - FRIDAY!

_June 29, 2016  
Four days after Siberia…_

Tony Stark could say, with not even the littlest bit of exaggeration or melodrama, that he was an intimate familiar of pain. He and pain were basically in a committed relationship, they’d been going steady for years now, and every time he thought that maybe they’d be putting some distance into the relationship, pain would decide against it.

And sometimes, pain decided it wasn’t being clingy enough. It wasn’t enough that Tony’s already damaged heart was broken, leaving him completely adrift as he tried his damndest to give Pepper the space she’d asked for before that speech at MIT. No, that wasn’t enough. Maybe the betrayal of the Avengers, the loss of his friends, and the concussion and cracked ribs he’d earned himself in Siberia would be enough. Tony really didn’t know how much more pain he could take, after all that.

Moving stiffly, he winced as he tried to straighten up in his chair in the lab. He should probably call it quits for the night, give his body a break and try to sleep, but he couldn’t handle the idea of facing an empty bed again, or the nightmares that just became more vivid and horrifying with every new trauma he lived through.

He swiped his hand through the air, “turning the page” on the holoscreen. He was going through files, everything he could dig up on Zemo, the Winter Soldier, Hydra, and anything else that popped into his head. He’d been going backwards, trying to put together the puzzle pieces, to find out just how Zemo had played them all so well.

There was… just one more thing he needed to know. But he’d been putting it off. Part of him didn’t want to know, and Tony wasn’t sure how far he’d have to go to get it.  
Invading his teammates’ privacy was something he never, ever did, not on purpose. He knew what was in their files, like they knew what was in his, but he’d never poked further, never tried to spy on them or find out more or dig up more info. But there was one more thing he needed to know, that he had to know, despite his reservations, and for that, he’d dig as deep as he needed to get. 

Taking a deep breath, he waved the holoscreen away, then spoke up.

“Hey, FRIDAY?”

“Yes, boss?”

He stared down at his hands for a minute, part of him still uncertain. “You maybe wanna be just a little bit of a villain tonight?”

“I’ve always considered myself just a little bit of a devil.” She replied in her Irish lilt.

“I need… I need to know how long Ste—Rogers knew about my parents.”

The AI was quiet for a moment. “Are you certain you want to find that out, boss?”

“No.” He huffed out a mirthless laugh. “But I need to know anyway. I need to know…” _how far back the betrayal goes, and how deep._

He took a sharp breath. “I just need to know, FRI. Find out for me?”

“Absolutely.”

He watched as she got to it. She displayed her searches on a few holoscreens, so he could see exactly what she was doing, and he had to admit, he was impressed at how easily she broke through the firewalls of literally every classified database she came up against. Damn, his kid was smart.

It took a while. Something like an hour before the searches started slowing, getting more specific. Images were still flickering on the screen too fast for Tony to really get a handle on the timeline she was working off of, but at last it came to a stop, with a security image of Rogers and Romanoff at some kind of military base, and a transcript of a conversation.

His mouth felt dry, and he had to swallow a few times before he could ask.

“How long, FRI?”

“The best guess according to the data is January 9th, 2014, when Captain Rogers and Agent Romanoff found the hidden room under SHIELD headquarters in Camp Lehigh.”

Shock rocked through him. “What? Two thousand four—two thousand and fricking fourteen? Seriously?”

FRIDAY sounded apologetic. “Yes, boss. Definitely no later than January 15th, 2014.”

“That—that’s two years. Two and a half years. He… he knew for two and half years, and he never…”

With a shaky sigh, Tony sat back, staring at the data FRIDAY was projecting for him, though he wasn’t seeing it. “He lied to me for two and a half years.”

“I’m so sorry, boss.” The AI’s voice was soft, impossibly kind, something she had learned from studying the archives of her older brother.

Tony put his face in his hands and cried.

* * *

_Two Years Later…_

Pepper knew that the expression on her face probably made it look like she was sucking on a lemon, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

She was _not_ pleased about what was currently happening, and she wasn’t about to pretend. Not for them.

Three of the rogue Avengers, as they’d been colloquially labeled through social media, had just gotten back to the Compound after a two year absence. Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes were remaining in Wakanda for the time being, Wanda Maximoff and Scott Lang had gone home, and Vision had gone with Wanda. That meant Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, and Clint Barton had just deplaned in the quinjet hangar and were making their way to the communal floor that the Avengers had spent so much time in together before everything fell apart.

And Pepper hated it. Every bit of it. She hated the hours upon hours Tony had spent, working himself to the bone to get the ex-Avengers pardoned and back without them going straight to jail. She hated the strain on his face now, both from exhaustion and the emotional turmoil at the thought of facing them again. She hated how hard he’d tried to get their quarters ready, making them as close as he could to how they had been before they had left.

But most of all, Pepper hated the way that as she held Tony’s hand and waited for Romanoff, Rogers, and Barton to meet them in the common area, she could feel him shaking.

“I’m here,” She whispered, just loud enough for him to hear. “And I’m not going anywhere.”

His breath caught just slightly and he gave her fingers a squeeze.

And then there they were, coming down the hall, and Pepper was feeling more of that lemon-face thing. Ugh, she was not excited about this.

All her worst fears were confirmed seconds later, when Barton’s first words when he came into the room were, “Hey, home sweet home. Got bars on all our windows, Stark?”

Romanoff hissed, “Clint!” and elbowed him hard, at the same time Pepper stiffened and glanced at Tony.

She saw the lightning-quick flash of hurt before he covered it up, the extinguished hope in his eyes that he’d been holding onto. She opened her mouth, probably to say something vicious, but he beat her to it. 

His voice was ice-cold and rock-steady when he looked all three of them in the eye, one by one. “You go right ahead and freeload off of someone else anytime. The door’s right there. Make sure to send in your change of address forms to the government on your way out.”

The rest of his carefully prepared comments were forgotten as he turned on his heel, and Pepper went with him as he left. She did shoot one more glance back at the other three over her shoulder, and read the surprise, anger, and dismay on their faces.

She wasn’t the least bit sorry.

* * *

“Well, that could have gone better.” Natasha muttered as Tony and Pepper disappeared down the stairs, noting the way Pepper caught up to him and slipped her hand in his. So they were still together. That was good.

“Could have gone worse, too.” Steve sighed, looking around at the common area that looked just the same as it had been two years ago, but felt very different.

“Was that really necessary?” Natasha asked Clint as he sat down on the couch, knocking a few pillows aside and looking around with a belligerent expression on his face.

“What? None of us are happy about this arrangement, least of all me. What’s the point of lying to each other now?”

“Maybe just keep the outright asshole behavior to yourself, hmm?” With that, Natasha left the communal area and headed for her room. It was going to be a difficult few days, what with Clint’s anger, Steve being defensive, and Tony obviously lacking the patience for any of it, and she really would rather not dive right into that right now.

Unfortunately, the next day wasn’t any better. Or the next. Or the one after that. And by the end of the week, Natasha started to suspect that it wasn’t ever going to get better.


	2. A Redhead's Temper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tensions between Tony and the ex-Avengers don't get any better. In fact, they get worse. And Pepper has had enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter fills my Pepperony Bingo square I5 - whump

The days passed, slowly turning into weeks as autumn bloomed and faded, and Tony tried. He tried so hard. He did everything he could, everything he could possibly think of to make Steve, Natasha, and Clint feel welcome. To make the Compound feel like home again, despite everything that had happened between them. He had still missed them, even though they had broken each other. They were his friends, almost his family in some ways, and he had missed what they had. 

So he tried. He had made sure that their rooms would be exactly how they left them, that all the foods they liked were well-stocked in the kitchen, that they had access to the best equipment, the best of everything. But despite all that, they shut him down at every turn. It only took one failed attempt at a team dinner that none of them showed up to for Tony to give up on that idea. They took to leaving the room when Tony entered, or walking right out if they saw him in the room they were going into. And one of them in particular seemed to take a sadistic pleasure out of making sure Tony knew exactly how much they hated him and every attempt he made to get things back to how they were.

Clint always had a snide, cutting comment prepared, any time Tony happened to be in the same room as him. He went from outright insulting Tony to obliquely alluding to all of his faults at his leisure. He wasn’t above deliberately shoving his shoulder into Tony’s when they passed in the hall, or sneering whenever he saw him. It was all very junior high, and Tony didn’t know whether to call him out on it or ignore it. Both options seemed insufficient, so more often than not, he responded in kind. Flinging his own sharp insults, making sure to really dig in and make it hurt when he retaliated, bringing out the worst in himself even though he knew he was falling into the same trap every time. He just couldn’t seem to help himself, not when it happened so often. He could take a lot, but letting himself be constantly verbally abused without any kind of response was too much to ask.

Steve, on the other hand, was just… cold. Utterly cold, all the time, and every interaction he and Tony had was stilted and uncomfortable. Tony knew it was because Steve was still convinced he had been right about everything, that Tony was wrong, and the guy was probably waiting for some kind of apology or something.

Tony could apologize for a lot of things, but he wouldn’t apologize for trying to save his family. Even though that plan had failed miserably, and the Avengers had splintered apart anyway, he would not apologize for doing his damnedest to keep all of them together in the safest way he could find.

He had hoped things would be okay with Natasha. They already had a weird relationship, distrust with some kind of odd friendship coating, so this was just stacking more issues on top of pre-existing problems. And she did make the most effort of the three of them. She was willing to be in the same room with Tony, she would talk to him, but it was distant and awkward. She had picked a side, and this time apparently she stuck with her decision. (Tony was trying really, _really_ hard not to be bitter about that, with mixed success.)

It seemed impossible, but they drifted even further apart than they were before. There was a clear divide, Tony vs. Them, and there wasn’t about to be any kind of truce.

So Tony backed off. He still lived there in his apartment suite with Pepper near the rear of the Compound, but they didn’t mingle with the rest of the Avengers. Pepper wasn’t really one to gravitate to the communal areas anyway, especially once the rest of them had gotten back. But Tony stopped going there too, and they both avoided the places where the rest of the Avengers were most likely to be.

It was wearing on him, despite how hard he tried to hide it. He was a master at this, masks and walls, and he had a full slew of them ready to go all the time. But living with masks up all the time was exhausting, and it started to show.

And it was on one particularly bad day, when the circles under Tony’s eyes were dark, the tension lines in his face were deep, and his shoulders were slumped with defeat that Pepper finally snapped.

* * *

Tony had been depressed all day. Not wanting to get up that morning, not wanting to leave the bed, or the bedroom, or their apartment. He was quiet and withdrawn, faking smiles for Pepper’s sake even though she could see right through them. He didn’t even want to go work in his lab or call Rhodey, though that last one was probably precisely because he wasn’t having an awesome mental health day and Rhodey would be able to tell.

Pepper was really irritated that she couldn’t stay home with Tony. She had SI business in the city that couldn’t be postponed, but though she had FRIDAY send her updates every hour and called Tony during her breaks, she still sighed with relief when she finally got home that evening. There wasn’t a lot she could do when Tony was having a bad day like this, they both just had to kind of weather the slump and wait for his mood to lift again, but she could at least hold him. He always liked that, he was the most tactile person she knew, with a weakness for cuddling and people playing with his hair. Her entire plan for the rest of the night involved Star Wars, the couch, Chinese food, and snuggling with her fiancé.

FRIDAY sent her an alert as she was sitting down to take off her shoes, informing her that Tony had ventured into the communal area (for the first time in well over a week). Feeling a sinking sensation in her stomach, Pepper took a deep breath, left her shoes on (sky high heels were good for when she wanted to feel intimidating), and tried not to imagine that she was going into battle when she left the apartment.

Unfortunately, her suspicions were right on the money. She could hear Steve and Clint’s voices as she neared the communal area, and they both sounded angry. Then Tony’s voice, and this time she could make out the words through the doors.

“So I thought it might be worth trying to be friends again. Apparently I was wrong.”

 _Oh no._ Sarcasm was his go-to weapon against verbal attacks, this wasn’t good. 

“Friends? After what you did, you think we can still be friends?”

Pepper approached the door and caught sight of them through it just as Steve stood up, storming towards Tony. Nobody could have noticed it but her, it was too subtle. Tony didn’t even really move, just stood there defiantly, holding his ground, chin up. But Pepper saw him flinch, the almost imperceptible tightening in his shoulders and hips, saw that hint of fear that he hid from everyone else, and everything inside her went molten with rage.

Clint was sprawled indolently across one of the yellow couches, but his eyes were sparking with anger as he remarked cruelly, “Hey, speaking of friends that you don’t have anymore, I haven’t seen Rhodey around lately. How’s he doing?”

That was _enough_.

“Excuse me?” Pepper’s voice rang through the communal area as she punched the doors open, and four faces whipped around to face her. Natasha was there too, standing at the island counter in the kitchen, silent and still as she watched.

Steve looked torn between staying angry and being contrite, Clint maintained his sullen expression, and Tony’s expression flickered just briefly, just enough for her to see the pleading desperation in his eyes before he covered it up again.

“Would someone care to explain to me what you three think gives you the right to attack my fiancé in his own home?”

Steve bristled, his chest puffing up like an angry hen. “We didn’t attack—”

“You just stormed towards him with your hands balled into fists. Exactly what kind of assumption am I supposed to draw from that? The last time you two ended up in an argument, Tony came home from Siberia with a concussion, a cracked sternum, broken ribs, and his arm in a sling. Are you telling me you’re over that now?”

Steve’s face reddened, but Pepper wasn’t sure if it was from anger or shame as she stalked towards him, her heels snapping loud against the floor. 

“That’s not fair.” He protested, and Pepper rode right over him. 

“Neither was that fight. Two against one? I thought you were better than that, Steve. I seem to recall you having an opinion about bullies.”

“It wasn’t my fault!”

“Yes,” Pepper bit out, her face hot as she got right in his face. “It was. It was, and is, entirely your fault. Everyone played their part in that fiasco, Tony and I would be the first to say it. Everyone made mistakes. But you? You were the linchpin. You were lying to Tony for _two years_. Two years, Steve! Every time you looked him in the face and didn’t tell him the truth about what happened to his parents, that was a lie. Siberia was _your fault_. Zemo never would have been able to tear everyone apart like he did if you hadn’t kept that secret.”

“But Bucky—”

“Tony would have done _anything_ to help you save him, Steve. Anything. And if you could step off your self-righteous throne of hypocrisy for two seconds, maybe you’d remember that. He was ready to sacrifice himself by flying a bomb away from Manhattan, just to save all your lives, do you think for one second he wouldn’t have done the same for your best friend, no matter what he'd been forced to do under Hydra's control?”

Pepper was shaking with anger, almost unable to control it as she jabbed her finger right at Steve’s chest, not letting him get a single word in edgewise as she glared up into his suddenly pale face.

“It’s _your_ fault, Steve. All of it. The blame rests entirely on those patriotic shoulders, and I hope you’re strong enough to stand up to the weight of it. Because it’s one hell of a heavy load. Just ask my fiancé. He’s carried it for you the entire time you’ve been gone, pretending to be a martyr because you didn’t get your way. And you.” Pepper turned on Natasha next, and the assassin actually flinched when the fury was turned on her.

“You knew too, you were right there when that psychotic computer brain showed it to the both of you, and you never told anyone? What the hell, Natasha?!”

Natasha’s lips were tight, pressed in a hard line that she had to all but pry apart to speak in a low voice. “It wasn’t my secret to tell.”

“It was your responsibility to look after the welfare of your _team_. If Tony had hidden a secret like that from you, or Steve, or Clint, would you have backed him up on it? Would you have stood there, saying nothing, for two years, knowing it was there and doing _nothing_ about it? Because I call bullshit. I call bullshit on all of you.”

“Steve promised me he’d tell Tony.” Natasha finally spat, clearly against her better judgement, sending a nervous glance towards Steve. “I asked him if he’d told Tony and he promised me he would.”

“That worked out really well for everyone in the end, didn’t it?” Pepper snapped, glaring around at all of them. “Now, I don’t care what you think, any of you. I don’t care where you think the blame for everything lies, but I do care about Tony. He worked his ass off for two years, trying to make it possible for you three to come back home without being arrested on sight. Do you have any idea how hard that was for him? To beg for forgiveness for the people that stared him in the face as they were stabbing him in the back?”

Her voice was trembling, she was so angry, and she took a moment to breathe before continuing. “Things will be changing around here, and I want one thing to be perfectly clear. This is not the Avengers Compound. Not anymore. It does not belong to you. This is _Tony’s home_. And you three, wallowing in your own pits of ungrateful misery, have made him feel unwelcome and damn near persecuted in his own home. That stops _now_. If I hear of any of you mistreating Tony again, in any way, I can promise you that it will take very little effort on my part to have your pardons rescinded, and I definitely won’t be crying when you get thrown in jail. In fact, right at this moment, I can’t say that the thought of it doesn’t make me want to smile.”

It was Clint’s turn, and though he managed to stand his ground, he was visibly shaken as Pepper turned to him.

“You will not make another snide, hateful comment, do you understand me? If you can’t keep a civil tongue in your head, you can leave. And I don’t mean leave the room, I mean leave this Compound, and don’t you dare come back. You knew the law, you broke it anyway, and you dragged Wanda along with you. There is absolutely zero room there for you to blame Tony for you getting your own asses thrown onto that Raft. Your choice, your consequences. So keep your mouth shut, got it?”

She glared around at all of them again, grinding her teeth. “Are there any questions?”

After a stunned moment of silence, they were all very quick to shake their heads.

“Good. Now get out.”

It didn’t matter in the slightest that they were in the communal area. The three ex-Avengers vanished as quick as ghosts, and then it was just Tony and Pepper left, staring at each other across the room.

Pepper knew she probably looked atrocious. Her face tended to get blotchy when she got upset, her pale skin going red in uneven patches, and she could feel the sting of angry tears behind her eyes. Tony was very pale behind his dark facial hair, and his wide brown eyes were looking at her with something like frightened awe.

“Pep…”

She didn’t say anything, just went towards him at a fast clip, her heels again echoing sharply in the mostly empty space. She threw her arms around Tony, feeling the surprise in the way his body jolted, but he wrapped his arms around her anyway, trembling slightly.

“I was done watching them hurt you.” She whispered roughly, holding onto him tight. 

“I could tell. Wow. My hero.” He managed to slip a hint of humor into it, and Pepper buried her face in the crook of his neck. 

“Anytime,” She murmured, her lips brushing against his skin.

He shivered slightly, then wrapped his arms just a little bit tighter around her. “That was the most badass thing I’ve ever seen.”

If their chuckles were the slightest bit watery and wobbly, it was nobody’s business but theirs


	3. Not Fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor returns, and has confidence in is ability to patch up the rift between his teammates. And perhaps, if it had been any other day, he might have succeeded.

They sat on the balcony outside their rooms late that night, both of them lost in their own thoughts as they sat in silence, wrapped in coats against the December chill that carried the scent of fresh snow in the air. After a long time, Steve spoke first.

“Natasha?”

“Mm?”

“Was she right?”

“Who?”

He glanced over at the spy's unreadable face. “Come on. Was Pepper right?”

She didn’t look at him as she folded her arms tighter, burying her hands in the folds of her coat. “I don’t know.”

“Nat…”

“Steve, I really don’t know.”

* * *

Thor showed up the next day, in his standard blaze of lawn-destroying rainbow magic. He’d been gone for two years (aside from a few brief and covert visits to see Jane Foster), having departed to Asgard after the Ultron fun times. 

He headed right for the communal area, and was welcomed back gladly by Steve, Natasha, and Clint, the four of them exchanging hugs and hellos.

“Banner has not returned yet?” Thor asked, unsurprised at the answer. “He happens to be my next order of business. I will take up the search once I have concluded my business here.”

“What business is that?” Natasha asked as they all sat down in the communal living room, Thor working his way through a giant bag of chips.

“My lady Jane. And checking up on all of you as well.” He winked at her. “You all seem to be in fine fettle.” He glanced around. “Where is Stark? Is he at one of his other homes?”

The other three went still, exchanging glances.

“Tony’s, um… he’s not hanging around much.” Steve tripped over the words clumsily.

“Or at all.” Natasha muttered.

Thor looked between them. “Was there a rift of some sort?”

“You might call it that.” Clint confirmed. “If you can call the Grand Canyon a rift.”

“There was… a fight, while you were gone.” Nat explained. “A big one.”

“With who?” Thor’s eyebrows contracted. “Not with Stark?”

“Yeah. With Tony. It was all of us fighting each other.”

The demigod looked shocked. “What kind of disagreement drove you to such measures?”

Natasha looked at Steve, who was resolutely looking away, and then at Clint, who met her eyes and then shrugged. 

She made quick work of it, explaining what had happened in Lagos and with the Accords, and Bucky Barnes, the dozen little steps that had resulted in a massive and costly fight in the middle of an airport.

“And then… I don’t know the rest of it, except for a few details. Steve and Tony fought in Siberia, and it was pretty bad. I left here and joined up with the others in Wakanda. We were doing what we could for the past couple years, helping where we could. We only came back a couple months ago. Tony… he arranged for us all to be pardoned.” 

She finished up, looking withdrawn and ashamed.

Thor just looked confused. “But surely enough time has passed that it’s better now? Such a quarrel shouldn’t still be causing such a separation.”

Natasha shook her head. “Thor, it was really bad.” 

“Worse than what we faced against the Chitauri? Against my brother?”

“In some ways… yes.”

Thor waved his hand in disbelief. “Come now, things can’t be as bad as they seem. I’ll speak with Stark. It’ll be fine.” He looked at the now-empty bag of chips in his hand, conversation apparently over. “I had forgotten how much I missed Midgardian food. Are there Poptarts?”

* * *

It was, however, not fine.

Tony had been excited to see Thor. More excited than he’d been about anything else for quite awhile. So far, this had been the worst December he’d had for a good long while, and literally the only thing he could find to be happy about was that he’d heard from FRIDAY that Bucky Barnes was staying in Wakanda for the time being, despite Steve’s invitation to join them at the Compound.

The invitation had come as a total fricking surprise to Tony, who would really rather not try and figure out the issues that he and Barnes had to work through while they were cohabiting and constantly under Steve’s eye. He needed, like… therapists and mediators for that kind of thing, not Captain Righteous Hypocrisy and his band of Accusing Avengers.

So there was that. Small blessings.

And then came Thor.

The demigod had come striding up to Tony early in the afternoon, when he’d been unloading a Christmas tree to take inside his and Pepper’s apartment. They had chit-chatted and caught up with each other while Thor hoisted the tree up in one arm and carried it inside easily, propping it against the wall. Then Tony had offered him coffee, slid a box of his very favorite pastries his way, and the good times ended there.

It had taken Thor all of thirty seconds to tell Tony, in his own probably well-meaning way, that the ex-Avengers should be forgiven and they should all resume their past buddy-buddy good times.

“They seem reasonably contrite.” Thor insisted, picking out a cherry turnover and smiling as if he was sure Tony would agree with him. “Surely you can put past hurts behind you now.”

Any other day… maybe. Maybe Tony would have been able to agree, despite knowing on some level that he deserved better, he would have been able to follow Thor’s lead and let the demigod find a way to fix the broken relationships he’d come back to. Any other day he might have been able to force it all back and maybe find some common ground to start rebuilding things.

Today, though… no. Not today. Not on the day that brought up so many past hurts and a whole slew of newer ones. Today, Tony felt entirely justified in the anger and pain that had been simmering under the surface for so long, no matter how he tried to ignore it. December 16th wasn’t just a day of mourning anymore. It was a reminder of one of the most personal, intentional betrayals in his life, and no matter how hard he tried to be, he wasn’t over that. 

He didn’t look at Thor as he poured coffee for both of them. “I want to, buddy. I really do. But I can’t.”

“Of course you can. Nothing can be so bad that it can’t be forgiven.”

“And usually I’d agree with you, having been forgiven for some pretty awful things in my time. But I can’t right now. Not today. Not after what happened. You weren’t here, you didn’t see it. And I can’t just let it go like it didn’t happen. I can’t.” He slid one of the mugs over, bracing himself to meet Thor’s eye.

Thor was looking at him like he had been taken aback and didn’t at all like what he was seeing. And Tony was so used to that, he was, he'd been a disappointment all his life. But, damn it, it still hurt every time it happened. 

“I hadn’t taken you for being so childish, Stark. You act it sometimes, but I had always thought there was more under the surface. How disappointing to realize that rather than being a hero behind the mask of an arrogant man, you’re just a selfish coward hiding behind the mask of a hero.”

He turned on his heel and left, coffee and pastries abandoned as he made his grand exit and didn’t look back.

Tony stayed where he was and slid his hands in his pockets, staring at his shoes and letting the hurtful words join the wave of other hurts that he was already drowning in.

He left the mugs and pastries on the counter. They didn’t sound appealing anymore. He just wanted to go to bed.

* * *

“Mr. Stark?” Peter’s voice sounded timid, and Tony really had to work on training that out of him. 

“What’s up, kid?”

“Um, I was just wondering… are you okay?”

Or maybe the timid thing was something he should appreciate and preserve…

“I’m fine, kid. Why do you ask?” Tony hid his wince. That last bit had kind of just flown out of his mouth. He hadn’t slept… well, at all, last night, and he tended to get more loose-lipped the longer he was awake. And he was going on hour forty-three right now.

“It’s just that… you look tired all the time when I see you. And you were so happy when you and Miss Potts got engaged, but then the rest of the Avengers came back, and I don’t think I’ve seen you really smile in weeks.”

The kid was far more observant than he had any right to be. “It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

Peter shook his head a little. “You worry about me, all the time. It’s only fair that I get to worry about you back.”

Tony couldn’t help the half-smile. “You’re sweet, kid. Thanks.”

“You need me to punch Captain America again? I think it went really well last time. I never really got a shot at Hawkeye or Black Widow though, I could do that too. Do I need to punch Thor also?”

Huffing out a chuckle, Tony ruffled a hand through Peter’s hair. “Nah, I’m fine. Promise. Things are rough right now, but they’re getting better.”

“You sure?”

_Nope._ “Yeah. Of course.”

“Okay.” The kid still looked concerned. “Would you tell me if it wasn’t fine anymore?”

Tony didn’t answer, and he pretended not to see the wounded expression on Peter’s face.


	4. Tony's Bad Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A kidnapping wasn't exactly part of Tony's plans during his and Pepper's getaway.

Christmas came and went. Pepper had insisted that they go somewhere, anywhere, to celebrate, so Tony had found a nice ski lodge in the Swiss Alps and they’d spent a couple weeks skiing and eating everything and doing all sorts of fun things in front of the big stone fireplace in their room. They’d also stopped by Tony’s house in Dubai for New Year’s, and then spent a couple days in California for old time’s sake. 

By the time they got back to the Compound, Tony felt much better. Three weeks away had done wonders for him. He didn’t feel like he had a knot in his stomach all the time, and he’d put back on some of the weight he’d lost from being constantly on edge and stressed out. His Pepper was a Very Wise Pepper, and he made sure to tell her so.

“I knew you needed a break before you broke.” She replied simply, kissing his cheek. “And I did too.”

It became a regular thing, and probably more frequent than it should have been. The ex-Avengers weren't openly hostile anymore, which was definitely an improvement, but the ever-increasing distance was still there and difficult to endure. So every few weeks, whenever the depression started to get bad again, when Tony started having more trouble sleeping or lost his appetite or didn’t want to do anything, Pepper would get them both out of the Compound. Sometimes it was business, sometimes it was pleasure, and Tony felt a little bit guilty either way. But not guilty enough to say no. 

So they went to Thailand to scope out some business prospects at the end of January, and then spent Valentine’s Day in Maui. They hit Spain and Germany in March for more business, and just as spring was finally getting a real hold on New York in April, they spent a few days in a hotel in Manhattan and didn’t leave the room once. At least, not until the third day, when Tony left a sleepy and satisfied Pepper in bed and ventured out in search of one of his favorite things.

That had apparently been where he’d gone wrong.

And it had been so stupid. Taken right out of the Kidnapping 101 Handbook, and Tony was disgusted at himself for being that easy. 

He’d walked out of his favorite coffee shop in Manhattan, not even two blocks from the hotel, and the utility van had pulled up next to him. It had taken all of three seconds for him to be grabbed and forced into the vehicle, the sharp pain of a needle in his neck all the warning he got before he was blacking out.

He woke up sometime later with a hell of a headache, tied to a chair in an old warehouse, with a handful of goons with guns surrounding him. The clichés would just not stop coming.

Tony groaned as he lifted his head and felt the crick in his neck, not seeing anyone wearing obvious “I’m in charge” pants in the immediate area. “Oh geez, you could have at least stopped for cheeseburgers on the way. I’m starving and I haven’t even had my coffee. Dick.”

“Ah, he awakens.”

The voice came from behind him, and Tony craned his neck trying to get a glimpse of whatever guy was apparently running the show. “Dick? Is that you?”

One of the goons stepped forward and backhanded Tony across the face, and he could feel his lip split as he swore.

“Tut tut, Mr. Stark. No need for that attitude or language.”

“Oh, go fornicate with yourself.” Tony spat back, secretly relieved when he didn’t get another smack in the face for that. “And while you’re at it, you maybe wanna explain why you abducted me from the perfectly lovely vacation I was just having with my superhot fiancée?”

“Is that why you were so easily taken? Well, no wonder. My men seemed almost perturbed with how easy it was to subdue you.”

“I’ll be sure to make it harder on them next time. If you schedule it with my assistant, I can probably even guarantee you a really good show.”

“I doubt that will be necessary. I have no plans to need you after we’re done here.”

Tony definitely didn’t let any apprehension or nerves show on his face at that ominous statement. But he still felt them. 

“So what do you want? I have to tell you, I’ve kind of done this whole abduction thing before, and not to brag, but it didn’t end too great for the bad guys. Maybe you should rethink this.”

There was the sound of a chuckle, then a man stepped into Tony’s field of vision. He looked… well, like a college professor, honestly. Middle-aged, balding, glasses, sweater vest, slight paunch around the middle. Unremarkable.

Tony quirked an eyebrow. “Okay, you look almost startlingly normal for an evil villain. No costume or catchphrase yet?”

The man smiled mildly. “No need. Only those with a following need a costume or catchphrase.”

“If that was a blow at my alter ego, you’re gonna have to hit harder next time.”

He just chuckled again and walked back around behind Tony, and now that his head was a little clearer, Tony could hear a quiet hum of machinery. He subtly tested the zip ties that were holding him to the chair, searching for weaknesses. So far nothing, which was just annoying. His hands were even zip-tied to the back of the chair on either side of him, so he couldn’t even work on getting one hand loose with the other. He talked while he did some more shifting, checking his ankles against the legs of the chair.

“So. You’re the psychotic villain of the week. What’s your manifesto, what kind of loose screws am I dealing with?”

“No manifesto. Just a plan for a better future.”

Tony rolled his eyes, which he regretted as it didn’t help his headache. “Oh, geez, you’re one of _those_.”

He chuckled again, and that was starting to get annoying. “Nothing so dramatic, I assure you. I don’t necessarily want a better future for everyone. Just for me will do.”

Not much better, really, but Tony wasn’t gonna point that out. His mouth twisted in displeasure as he realized that all the zip ties were definitely gonna hold, and he didn’t have the proper angle or leverage to try to break them. 

“What’s the plan now?” He asked as he shifted again in the chair, testing for creaks and wobbles. No such luck, the thing was literally bolted to the concrete floor.

“Nothing you need worry about. Much as I’m sure your mind would come in very handy, I doubt you’d really help me. So for now, we just wait. That’s what bait does.”

“Bait, huh? I’m not really good bait, I have to tell you. Far more trouble than I’m worth.”

“We’ll see. Do stop wiggling. You’re not going anywhere.”

Tony gave another blatant, defiant wiggle (he didn’t take kindly to bad guys telling him what to do), and wasn’t surprised when the same goon from before hit him again, the other side of his face this time.

He saw stars for a second, the impact on his cheekbone sending ringing pain through his head. Okay, that was enough for now. Any more of a headache and he’d throw up all over his own lap, which was not an injustice he wanted to deal with today.

* * *

The hours passed agonizingly slowly. Between the boredom, being hungry and thirsty, and his flat inability to refrain from taunting the psycho behind him and the goons in front of him, Tony was having a bad day.

He definitely had two black eyes, and the split lip which was really swollen and hurt like a bitch no matter what he did. He had a couple cuts on his face, one over his eyebrow that had bled and gotten blood in his eyelashes, which was an entirely unpleasant sensation. He could also feel the tacky spot on his neck where his shirt was also bloodstained from a cut on his cheek.

Oh yeah, and he might have a cracked rib or two from when one of the goons hadn’t taken particularly well to Tony implying something inappropriate about his mother.

Sigh. Bad day.

“Any chance I might be able to do anything to hurry you along, back there?” Tony asked, realizing it had been awhile since either of them had spoken (the goons didn’t speak, they just stood there with their guns and looked menacing).

The psycho in the sweater vest snorted delicately. “Oh, I will not be making the mistake of putting tools into your hands, Stark. That’s not necessary at all. No, I’m afraid that all I need you from you is your mere presence. That will be enough.”

“Uh huh. You sure I’m just bait? Kinda feeling like a hostage, I won’t lie.”

“You’re both, I suppose, depending on how the situation goes. You understand.”

“I’ve been told I’m not very understanding. Nor am I soothed, seeing as how things usually end up for the bait or the hostage. What’s your plan with me, huh? Gonna kill me if it comes to it?”

“Oh, I don’t think it will come to that.” The psycho sounded like he was smiling. “You’ve got friends in high places that will surely be along soon enough to rescue one of their own.”

“You mean the Avengers?” Tony didn’t try to hide the scathing tone in his voice. “Or whatever is left of them? No. They won’t be coming for me. Even if we were still a team, they wouldn’t come for me.”

Another delicate snort, and a tone of mild superiority. “Of course that’s something you’d say. Hoping to lull me into a false sense of security?”

Tony snorted right back, but it was anything but delicate. “Why bother? It’s the truth. Bruce Banner is missing, we don’t even know if he’s alive or on the planet anymore. Thor is off elsewhere as often as he’s here, and Black Widow, Hawkeye, and Captain America went rogue. They might be back, but we’re not friends anymore. We’re not a team. The Avengers don’t exist anymore, and the ones that are still around wouldn’t care if I lived or died anyway. They’d all be more than happy to hear that I’m captured or dead, so don’t hold your breath on that rescue. I never meant much to them before, and any concern now is nonexistent.”

Dick was silent for awhile, as if Tony had somehow surprised him. “That is… honestly the truth as you know it, isn’t it?”

“The people who used to be Avengers will not come for me.” Tony said baldly, wishing he could look this would-be villain in the face so he could read the truth of it in Tony’s eyes. “The last time we were a team, Steve Rogers left me for dead after nearly killing me with his brainwashed cyborg buddy. Natasha Romanoff told me to watch my back before joining him. Clint Barton blamed his incarceration solely on me, regardless of his own actions. They’re only back on American soil because I pulled every string I could get my hands on to make it possible, but we’re not a team anymore. We’re just people that happen to share a past and try real hard to avoid each other. They’re not coming for me. They’re not gonna save me. It won’t even be a blip on their radar when they find out I’m dead.”

“Perhaps we will see that you’re wrong,” Dick said thoughtfully, typing on a keyboard by the sound of it. “Heroes never do change, after all.”

Tony laughed bitterly and without any mirth at all. “Sure. You keep telling yourself that.”


	5. Waiting Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The hours drag by and a rescue attempt is made.

Ugh. Tony was bored. Not only had it been hours (and _no_ , he was not exaggerating for dramatic effect, it had literally been hours), which meant he was hungry, thirsty, and had to pee, but no matter how far he strained his muscles, he still couldn’t see what was going on behind him. And it was driving him _nuts_. He knew it was some kind of machinery, he’d know the sounds of gears, rotors, and hydraulics anywhere. But there was more to it. Unfortunately, every time he tried to look again, one of the goons took the opportunity to smack him around some more.

“I’ve got an itch on my nose, do you mind?” He taunted as one of them stepped forward to punish him for his most recent attempt to see out the back of his own head.

The goon actually paused, looking briefly confused, and Tony couldn’t help but laugh. At least until he got clocked in the jaw and was seeing stars again. That got less funny as time went by.

“Out of morbid curiosity, since I have literally nothing better to do than talk to you,” Tony called over his shoulder when his ears stopped ringing, wondering if he could annoy this would-be villain into losing his temper, “which of the Avengers specifically are you hoping makes an appearance?”

“And what makes you think I’m waiting for one in particular?”

“Well, if you’re waiting for the whole set, you already know we’re missing one of the original six.”

Dick was sounding somewhat thoughtful, as if he were stroking his evil villain mustache (shut up, Tony could give the bad guy a mustache if he wanted to). “I don’t suppose it would hurt to tell you. It won’t matter afterwards anyway.”

And okay, that was probably the most concerning thing the guy had said so far. Either Tony wasn’t gonna be alive after all this, or something equally bad but less life-threatening was imminent. Not that Tony hadn’t had waaaay more than his fair share of brushes with death, but c’mon. It wasn't like he enjoyed this. He’d rather be back in the hotel he’d left that morning, in that big bed, with any number of Pepper’s limbs wrapped around him than zip-tied to this stupid reinforced chair in a warehouse in the middle of nowhere.

“It’s interesting, that though Steve Rogers is alive and well, and proof that the serum in his blood works, nothing has been done to try and replicate it.”

“Oh, it’s been tried.” Tony replied. “There was even one questionable success before Bruce Banner’s greener alter ego beat him into the Harlem asphalt.”

“Yes, so I discovered. But that was a combination of formulas that did not mix well. And besides, I really don’t need the serum for what it was intended. I have no need to muscle my way in and out of conflicts.”

“You wanna bet?” Tony muttered under his breath, casting a glance around at the assembled goons.

“Rather,” Dick continued, “it’s the endurance and enhanced healing that appeal to me. It would be a great benefit to my work.”

“And what work is that? You never did say.”

“You will see soon enough, Stark. You will see soon enough.”

* * *

Twilight had fallen outside, and Tony was _still_ zip-tied to the chair. And in the gathering darkness, he’d also had a floodlight fixed on his face by one of the goons, so that was super awesome.

“How much longer you gonna wait?” He asked, his voice slightly rough. He was hungry and dehydrated, his mouth dry and sticky, not to mention the headache that was just getting worse. And he hurt _everywhere_. “Can I make a suggestion that we call it a day and reconvene tomorrow?”

Dick just chuckled. “Now now, where is your patience?”

“Pretty sure I left it on the street this morning when you nabbed me and made me drop my good coffee.”

There was no answer, and Tony was just too tired to force the conversation. He let his chin rest on his chest, hoping if he’d be able to doze off for awhile, knowing he wouldn’t. Even if he hadn't been in so much pain, sleeping while in captivity wasn’t something he’d ever mastered.

There was the regular pacing and shifting from the goons. The typing and other miscellaneous sounds from behind him, along with the machinery. Some crickets. And then something else…

It started out with an almost indistinguishable whining noise. Tony didn’t even notice it at first, but he blamed that on the noise of the machine behind him and the fact that he hadn’t had any coffee for over twenty-four hours now. But then it got louder, and Tony couldn’t help but look up, something burning hot in his chest.

Dick sounded extremely smug when he spoke, obviously having noticed the noise. “And here you thought no one would come for you.”

Tony snorted out a laugh. “I never said that.”

It was like he could _hear_ the smugness fade and confusion taking its place. “What?”

Tony just smiled grimly. “I said the _Avengers_ would never come for me.”

And like it had been planned, as if it had been perfectly choreographed for months beforehand, at that moment the warehouse wall exploded, and War Machine came tearing through.

It was utter chaos after that. Tony ducked his head as Rhodey went to work, guns blazing. Goons were firing back, Dick was back there shouting and swearing, and Tony wondered if he was scrambling for cover or fussing with his machine. He kind of hoped for the first option, since he still had no idea what Super Dick was even doing.

After a minute of laying cover fire, Rhodey managed to do a fly-by and yank the reinforced chair right out of the concrete, and Tony yelled in a combination of fear and terror as he felt the zip ties around his hands get shredded and he was dropped. Not _far_ , but still. Far enough that he landed hard and definitely tore open the knees of his pants and scraped up his palms.

“RHODEY, YOU JERK, YOU COULD HAVE FLOWN LOWER!”

Ignoring the way his hands smarted and his knees were bleeding, he dug around in his pockets, hoping his little multitool was still in there, or maybe his keys. No such luck, so he scooted along the floor, chair still attached to his legs, until he found a sharp enough bit of concrete rubble. He hacked off the zip ties and scrambled to his feet, taking stock of the situation.

Rhodey was still zooming around being all badass and taking out goons left and right, Dick was running around the machine to avoid him, and Tony made his decision. He took off for the machine at a run, figuring he could either jump on Dick and hold him down until Rhodey landed, or maybe disable the machine permanently. Both options were great.

He sized up the monstrosity of a science project as he ran, and located the keyboard that Dick had been typing on. He skidded to a halt in front of it, and read the data on the screen.

“Oh, you’re not really doing what I think you’re doing, are you?” He muttered to himself as his fingers flew over the keyboard, finally piecing it all together. What the mess of machinery and who-knew-what-else was for, and why Dick had been waiting for Steve.

“Too bad for you, Dickwad,” He murmured, glancing around to find the easiest way to disable the machine. It was put together badly, probably because it was a mishmash of various technologies and, dare he say it, magic, so there wasn’t an obvious solution apparent.

“Tony!”

That was all the warning he got before Dick was barreling into him, tackling him out of the way, and then scrambling back up again to get his hands on the keyboard. A quick sequence of keys, and the screen lit green.

“No!” Tony yelled, most of the wind knocked out of him, but it was too late. The little switch next to the keyboard had lit up, and Dick was flipping it before either Tony or Rhodey could reach him.

A deafening boom and a blinding bright blue light knocked Tony senseless, and he fell back to the ground in a crumpled heap as something inside the machine imploded. An explosion rocked the very ground, and in mere moments, he had been buried by the wreckage and rubble that was all that was left of the machine.


	6. Very Familiar Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhodey's in a panic trying to find Tony in the rubble created by the explosion. Problem is, Tony isn't there. There's just a little kid with big brown eyes that look awfully familiar...
> 
> This crosses off two squares! TSB square K2 – flying, and Pepperony Bingo square N2 – James "Rhodey" Rhodes
> 
> AND YOU GET SOME TEASER ART! My wonderful, AMAZING artist, [hereannowwearealive ](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/)  
> ([Sadekuuro on AO3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)), drew several sketches and two full-color finished digital artworks for this fic, and I am SO EXCITED for everyone to see them! I have been keysmashing and shrieking about this art for ages now!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Through A Child's Eyes, It's Different - Chapter 6: Very Familiar Eyes  
> Collaborator: rebelmeg  
> TSB Card Number: 3055  
> Square Filled: K2 – flying  
> Ship: Pepperony, Tony & Avengers, Iron Squad  
> Rating: Teen  
> Major Tags: deaged Tony, angst/fluff/humor, science and magic gone wrong, post-CACW drama, Team Cap Critical  
> Summary: Rhodey's in a panic trying to find Tony in the rubble created by the explosion. Problem is, Tony isn't there. There's just a little kid with big brown eyes that look awfully familiar...  
> Word Count: 12,090

It was possible that the armor’s helmet was all that kept Rhodey from being permanently blinded by the blue light emitted by the machine. His sensors went haywire, and he was flung backwards into the wall of the warehouse by the explosion that followed, but the boots were working enough that he could lower himself to the ground rather than crashing. He stumbled as he did so, rattled by the explosion, and almost shaking with the adrenaline coursing through him, but he wasn’t done yet.

Rhodey looked around, trying to peer through the dust and smoke clouding the air in the wake of the boom to where he’d last seen Tony. It was hard to tell, because the machine had been leveled, but the definitely dead flavor-of-the-week villain was partially visible under one of the bigger pieces of shredded machinery.

“Tony! You hear me?” He fought his way forward, stepping through the mess on the floor and turning on helmet’s exterior flashlights. “Tony!”

No response, but he didn’t let himself panic. This was Tony. He was basically physically incapable of dying, people had written papers about it. Rhodey ran a scan, but things were too hot from the explosion to locate body heat reliably.

“Let me tell you, it’s a good thing you’ve got me here to back you up on this hostage thing, because Pepper was spitting mad when she thought you’d taken off to be a hero again. You would have been permanently exiled to the doghouse, my friend, and no take-backs on that. Tony?”

Okay, so he was a little worried. Just a smidge.

He pressed forward, getting closer to where the machine had stood, lifting bigger pieces to check under them. Still nothing, and with every passing moment, Rhodey got closer to admitting that he might be starting to panic.

“Tony, come on! Don’t make me dig through all this to find you! I’ll tell Pepper you did this on purpose, I swear I will!” 

He checked the mad scientist bozo once he got close enough, scanning for a pulse even though it was obvious the guy was dead. “Tony!”

His head turned, and he scanned the area to his left. Had he heard something? Or was it just panic-driven wishful thinking? He listened closely, holding still so the noise of the armor wouldn’t interfere. “Tony?”

Another muffled sound, one he couldn’t make out clearly with the helmet still on, so Rhodey retracted it and moved over further, listening hard as dust continued to settle around him. 

“Help!”

He heard it that time, just faintly, and he paused. “Hey, can you hear me?”

“Help me!”

It sounded like… was it a woman? A kid, maybe? Why the hell would a kid be here? He followed the sound when it came again, further to the left and closer to the machine. 

“Help me, please! I’m stuck!”

It was definitely a kid, Rhodey was sure now, and he had finally zeroed in on where the voice was coming from. “I’m right here, it’s okay! I’m coming.”

Pieces of twisted metal and ruined machinery parts were thrown aside as he searched, and it was when he bent a piece of sheet metal out of the way that he finally found the kid.

He was little, maybe five or six years old, and Rhodey was baffled as to how and why the kid was even here. There hadn’t even been a trace of him before, not in the whole warehouse. The kid was covered with debris from the explosion, bits of rubble all over his dark hair and dust smudged on his face. His big brown eyes were teary, but he didn’t seem hysterical as Rhodey carefully maneuvered him out, lifting him free of the rubble.

“Hey, kid, you okay? You hurt?”

“I’m okay now. It hurted before, but not anymore.” 

That was… concerning, but with every minute that passed, Rhodey’s panic grew. He still hadn’t found Tony.

“Listen, I’ll take care of you and get you somewhere safe in a minute, I just have to find my friend first, okay? You stay right here.”

If he hadn’t been so distracted, Rhodey might have taken more notice of the weird clothes the kid was wearing. A dirty white dress shirt, man-sized, nearly falling off those little shoulders. His fingertips were barely visible under the edge of the loose, rolled up sleeves, and his feet were hidden under the hem.

But Rhodey didn’t have time to take it all in, so he briefly glanced at the kid to make sure he was staying put and not in immediate danger, then went back to trying to find Tony. He ran a scan again with the armor, searching for movement, for vital signs, anything. “Come on, Tones, where are you?”

He took a few steps, kicking more rubble out of the way, but then—

“Wo-dey?”

Rhodey startled at the voice and looked back at the little boy, the way he cocked his head slightly to the side, those eyes narrowing slightly. It was so familiar, it was as if…

“Holy _shit_. Tony?!”

The little boy blinked then nodded, speaking with a slight speech impediment. “Wo-dey, you came to rescue me?”

Rhodey scrambled back to the kid and crouched down to look the boy in the eye, peering at him closely. “Tony is that really you?”

The boy nodded, and reached out with a tiny hand to trace the shape of the glowing red spot where the arc reactor that powered the War Machine armor sat. “The big machine was really loud and made lightning happen. It made me hurt all over.” He looked into Rhodey’s face. “Can we go home? I’m hungry.”

Rhodey had no idea what to say, no idea how this had happened, and no context for what to do. Through the mess of chaos and confusion in his mind, he managed to focus on one thing: according to the scans he was doing with the armor, this kid was the only other living human around, so even if Tony, real, adult Tony _had_ been here, he wasn’t anymore. There was no reason to stay, and like hell was he going to leave a little kid here. A little kid that had big expressive eyes exactly like the Tony he knew.

"Hey, Tony? Can you answer a question for me?"

The little boy nodded solemnly, some dust falling from his hair.

"When we went to school together, what poster did we have on our wall?" Couldn't hurt to try and check, right?

He grinned, and wow, that was so _Tony_ that Rhodey almost didn't need to hear the answer. "Star Wars on my side, Star Trek on your side. But you had a big crush on Leia."

Yep. It was almost definitely him. "Okay. Yeah, we’re gonna go home now.” Despite being about 90% sure that this kid was indeed Tony, Rhodey still reached out tentatively, not sure what he was doing as he tugged up the filthy and torn dress shirt so it sat more evenly on those little shoulders. The rest of the clothes were where the kid had been in the rubble, and Rhodey recognized those stupid-expensive dress shoes. Definitely Tony’s, and so was that tie. Only Tony would wear a custom-made Italian silk necktie with a binary pattern weaved into the fabric.

He ended up ripping little holes near the top of the sleeves, so the boy could get his arms out, and wrapping the remaining sleeve lengths around his back, using the cuff buttons to secure them. He had to button it up all the way to the collar to keep it from falling off Tony’s shoulders, but once he got the necktie fastened around that little waist like a sash, it wasn’t too bad. It would stay on the kid, at least.

Rhodey was stymied for a minute, trying to figure out how to get them both up to the quinjet, but there was nothing for it, so he held his arms out. Tony went right into them easily, not even phased at the hard metal of the armor, wrapping his bare legs around War Machine’s waist and holding on tight.

“We’re gonna fly?”

“For a minute, yeah, I guess. Just up to the quinjet. I didn’t know what I was flying into and wanted to make sure I could get… _you_ … home. I brought your travel armor too, but it won't fit now.” 

Wow, he needed to take five minutes to process this, his mind was whirling.

Forcing himself to focus long enough to get them both to safety, Rhodey locked one arm around the kid and took off, leaving through the same hole in the wall that he’d made coming in a few minutes ago.

Through his helmet, he could hear the kid screaming, and he looked down with concern. But rather than looking terrified, the little boy had the biggest grin on his face, his eyes wide open and watering slightly from the rush of wind, looking like he was having the time of his life.

Heck, maybe it really, actually _was_ Tony.

* * *

Pepper had been pacing around the landing pad outside their apartment at the Compound for the last twenty minutes. She was cold, she had knots in her shoulders from all the tension in them, and she’d been looking up at the sky and watching for the quinjet for so long that her vision was starting to blur.

She stopped chewing on her thumbnail long enough to ask, “FRIDAY, how—”

“They’re on approach right now, girl boss.”

A shudder of relief went through her and Pepper moved off to the side of the landing pad to leave it clear. A minute later she could finally see the quinjet, and it had barely landed before she was at the back, waiting for the hatch to open.

But then it did. And there was Rhodey, looking a little banged up and dusty, but clearly no worse for wear. But instead of Tony, who she had been steeling herself to see brought out on a stretcher, if things had been bad... instead there was a little boy with tousled brown hair and big brown eyes, holding Rhodey’s hand and looking around curiously.

“Rhodey. Who is that?”

He rubbed at the back of his neck, looking uncomfortable as the little boy stared up at Pepper. “Um. Funny story there.”

That was not comforting. “Rhodey. Speak. Now.”

He opened his mouth to do so, but then the little boy took a step forward, and a smile broke out on his face. “Peppoh?”

She stared at him. There was… something familiar about him. Something in his face, or the way he smiled, it was almost as if… as if…

The relieved smile that had been on Pepper’s face a minute ago when the quinjet touched down was now frozen into a false mask of composure, and though her voice was calm outwardly, she could hear the panic running under it when she spoke quietly.

“Rhodey… why is that little boy wearing my fiancé’s face?”

Rhodey sighed, deep and long. “Because he _is_ your fiancé.”

A flurry of emotions and reactions battled for dominance over the next few seconds, and it was a struggle to force it all aside, and to not let them appear on her face. She didn’t have time to fall apart right now, not if this was real. Pepper glanced at Rhodey, just for a second, desperately hoping he’d grin and say, “April Fool’s!” But he didn’t, so she took a deep breath and looked down. The little boy was still holding Rhodey’s hand, and he was looking up at her expectantly.

“Tony?” Pepper crouched down and peered into his little face, recognizing so many of those features under the streaks of grime, but especially the eyes. Those big, brown Bambi eyes with thick lashes that clumped up so noticeably on the bottom. “Tony, do you remember me?”

He smiled at her shyly, his whole face transforming. “You’re my Peppoh,” He said quietly, his body rocking back and forth a little as he turned a bit on one bare foot. When he saw her smile back, he reached out with one hand, that sweet smile growing wider. “I love you.”

Pepper felt like she could explode and melt at the same time, and took his hand in hers. “I love you too, sweetheart. What on earth happened? You had a beard when you left yesterday!”

She kept her tone light and teasing, not wanting to frighten him, and the way he giggled was absolutely precious. “I got small. The bad guy’s machine broke. But Rhodey rescued me.”

“He sure did, and it’s a good thing. I missed you, I was worried.” Pepper cupped Tony’s small, round cheek in her hand, smoothing an errant dusty curl away from his forehead. He leaned into her touch, sighing a little, looking at her adoringly with those big brown eyes as he smiled. It was honestly the sweetest, most precious thing she’d ever seen, and it was taking everything in her power not to pull the little boy into her arms and just hug the stuffing out of him. He’d probably let her do it, too, if he was indeed her own Tony just shrunk down bite-sized. Lord knew that man was a sucker for cuddles.

“Hey, Tony?” Rhodey crouched down as well so he was eye-level with the little boy. “Do you remember Happy? He’s right over there.” 

Tony and Pepper both looked where Rhodey pointed to see that Happy had come out. FRIDAY had probably told him they were back and updated him on the situation, and after a pause, Tony’s face broke out into another smile and he waved. “I know Happy! He’s my buddy, he teaches me fighting.”

Happy (who was soft as the gooiest of marshmallows under that stern, anxiety-ridden exterior), immediately flushed as he heard Tony’s words, waving back awkwardly and trying not to smile.

“Yeah, that’s right." Rhodey said. "We’re all gonna go inside, and then do you think you can go hang out with Happy for just a couple minutes? I need to talk to Pepper about some grown up stuff. Is that okay?”

Tony looked between the two of them, his face clouding with worry. “You’ll come back?”

“We’re not going anywhere, sweetie,” Pepper reassured him, brushing her fingers through his soft, loose curls, feeling the way they were familiar to her touch though they sat on a much smaller head and were covered in dust and dirt. “We’ll stay right where you can see us, okay?”

Looking relieved, Tony nodded, giving her hand a squeeze before letting Rhodey take his other hand and lead him over to Happy. They went inside together, gathering in Tony and Pepper’s living room, and it only took a minute for Tony to become enthralled with a game FRIDAY had sent to Happy’s StarkPad. He sat contentedly on Happy’s lap on the couch and glanced up every so often to make sure Pepper and Rhodey were still in the kitchen just across the room.

[](http://imgbox.com/I0LwKZQo)

“I don’t understand.” Pepper murmured once Tony was situated, her worry finally coming out. “How does he know who we are, but still act like a little kid? How is that possible?”

Rhodey shook his head, identical concern on his own face as he leaned back against the counter. “I don’t know. But that seems to be exactly what it is. I asked him some questions on the way over, to kind of get a feel for it all, and as far as I can tell, he remembers everything, his whole life. He just remembers it like a kid would. He remembers his parents dying, and both Edwin Jarvis and AI JARVIS, being at MIT with me, running SI, and becoming Iron Man and all that. He remembered details, things that an impostor couldn't possibly know. But the way he talked about them, it was just like a little kid would say it. He’s Tony, our Tony, just pocket-sized and with the actual mind of a child. I’m his best friend, you’re his Pepper, Happy is his buddy, this Compound is our house, and he really likes flying with me.”

Pepper was absentmindedly chewing on her thumbnail again as she watched Tony and Happy, and when the little boy threw up his hands and cheered, she couldn’t help but smile.

“He is _adorable_.”

“He is,” Rhodey admitted easily. “You should have heard him screaming and whooping while I flew us up to the quinjet, like it was the best roller coaster ever.”

Tony was talking to Happy as he played the game on the StarkPad, and looked up at his former bodyguard with an expression of utter mischief as he gently booped the man right on the nose. Happy pretended to be outraged, setting the tablet aside and tickling Tony until he shrieked with laughter, squirming around and grabbing at Happy’s hands to try and retaliate.

“I can’t even stand it, _look at him_ ,” Pepper gushed, and Rhodey had to fight back a smile too.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you prefer the kid version rather than the adult one.”

Pepper smacked his shoulder. “Don’t be stupid, of course I don’t. Clearly Tony is my favorite person in all his forms, but I am going to need my fiancé-size Tony back at some point.” A wrinkle creased her forehead. “Any ideas on that?”

Rhodey shook his head helplessly and shrugged. “Not a one. I’m here for my military skills, not my magic skills. I majored in rocket science, not whatever tomfoolery this is.”

Putting her hands on her hips, Pepper switched into business mode. “Okay. First things first. He needs a bath, and something to wear other than that filthy shirt.”

“Are you disparaging my one and only attempt at children’s fashion, Pepper?” Rhodey teased.

Pepper grinned at him. “Don’t quit your day job.”


	7. Unpleasant Underwear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tiny Tony has a bath, steals pepperoni, tries to resist bedtime, and continues to utterly charm the three people that are most important to him.

An hour later, Happy brought up the package of clothes that Pepper had asked FRIDAY to rush order, just in time for a freshly bathed Tony to get dressed. The little boy had had a ball in the tub, splashing around and playing with the bubbles, looking blissed out as Pepper washed his hair and only fussing a little when she insisted on gently scrubbing his skin with a soapy washcloth. She ended up nearly as soaked as he did, and passed off a tiny, towel-wrapped Tony to a waiting Rhodey while she went and changed clothes herself.

“I don’t like those.” Tony informed Rhodey once he saw the pajamas laid out for him. “They’re kid clothes.”

“Well, you’re kinda kid-sized right now, Tones. You don’t have a whole lotta options.”

Tony frowned, which was adorable, but let Rhodey help him get dressed. “Do I have to wear kid clothes all the time now?”

“I don’t know, bud. We don’t know how long you’re gonna be kid-sized, you know. But I’m sure we can figure something out.”

Tony scowled at his superhero-themed underwear as Rhodey held out his pajama pants. “I don’t even _like_ Batman.”

“But you do like dinosaurs.” Rhodey waved the pajama shirt with toothily smiling t-rex on the front at him.

“Not when they’re on my _clothes_.”

Rhodey snorted. “Excuse you, this is coming from the kid that wore a Jurassic Park t-shirt for most of ’94? You were twenty-four at the time, just in case you were wondering about the maturity of that decision.”

“Jurassic Park is cool!”

“You know what, I’m not willing to have this argument while you don’t have facial hair.” He tugged the pajama shirt over Tony’s head, giving his damp curls a ruffle while the little boy wiggled his arms into the sleeves. “Okay, let’s go find Pepper and find out what’s next.”

Pepper was in the kitchen finishing up an order for pizza, and she grinned at the two of them when they came in. “You look much better, all clean and dressed!”

“I don’t like my underwear.” Tony announced, making Rhodey laugh.

“You know what? I don’t like mine either. We’ll both buy some new underwear tomorrow.” She turned to Rhodey while Tony went running to the couch to sit with Happy again. “You’re staying for dinner?”

“I’m gonna go back there, actually. Grab what I can, so we can start working on this. Find out what the heck happened.”

“You want backup?” Pepper asked.

Rhodey shook his head. “Nah, nothing and no one survived that explosion except Tony. You stay with him. Give Happy a break.”

Pepper grinned as she glanced at the man, who was looking equal parts exasperated and fond as Tony climbed all over him, chattering excitedly. “Yeah, good idea. We should probably try the sleep thing at some point. I really hope this version of Tony doesn’t keep the same sleeping schedule as the big one does.”

“I do too, because that would be utter hell.”

* * *

Rhodey left, the pizza arrived, and the two adults pretended not to notice when Tony began stealing pieces of pepperoni off the pizza still in the box after finishing his own slice.

“I know I should stop him,” Pepper murmured to Happy at one point, watching as Tony stuffed another pilfered pepperoni slice into his mouth, looking pleased with himself. “But he’s so dang cute I can’t help it.”

“I know,” Happy sighed, watching as the little boy’s fingers crept into the box again, “I’m having the same problem. If he was his normal adult size, I would have punched him in the arm by now.”

The mere suggestion of bedtime had Tony immediately begging not to go to bed yet, which wasn’t a surprise. Happy was quick to come up with a solution, an old standby that he’d been using for years when Tony didn’t want to sleep.

“How about we watch a movie until you’re sleepy?”

Pepper had sent him a sideways glance then, but didn’t say anything. He knew what she was thinking, though. Would this tactic that sometimes worked on regular-size Tony work on tiny-size Tony?

They got settled on the couch, Happy and Pepper on each end with Tony stretched out between them, his head on Pepper’s thigh. FRIDAY queued up Emperor’s New Groove, and Kuzco hadn’t even been turned into a llama before Tony had conked out. 

“Poor thing. I don’t even know what happened to him, but he’s had a rough day.” Pepper said quietly as she slowly stroked her hand through his hair. 

“Nothing good, that’s for sure. You need help getting him to bed?”

“Nah, I’ve got him. I’m gonna go to sleep too, I think. I’m pretty tired.”

Happy nodded sympathetically. “You’ve been worried about him. I’ll catch up with Rhodey when he gets back.”

Pepper slowly stood, Tony cradled in her arms. “Thanks, Happy. I’m so glad you were here.”

“Anytime.”

* * *

“Find anything?” Happy asked when Rhodey disembarked from the quinjet a couple hours later pushing a dolly loaded with boxes.

“Kinda. Grabbed what I could from the machine, but it’s not really my area of expertise. I’ll need to take something bigger to get the rest of it. This is fun though.” He motioned to one of the boxes he’d loaded up. “He had cameras.”

“What?”

“Yep. A lotta them, stuck around everywhere.”

“Are you serious? This guy filmed everything?”

Rhodey shrugged. “Apparently.”

Muttering about how villains were getting dumber every year, Happy picked up one of the boxes and headed inside.


	8. Bringing In Help

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhodey, Pepper, and Happy have no idea how the mysterious machine managed to deage Tony, so they bring in some help to try and figure it out.

Pepper only stayed to watch the first hour of footage on the screens in Tony’s lab. Not much happened, the bad guy messed around with the machine that had apparently deaged Tony, then a bunch of goons arrived with an unconscious Tony in tow. After awhile he woke up, cranky and sarcastic, trading taunts with the bad guy (Pepper actually snorted a laugh when Tony started calling him Dick), but then it started to get more physical. Once the second punch was thrown, she couldn’t do it anymore, and Rhodey and Happy watched the remaining hours without her. They did call her back to watch the end, though. The part where the machine that the villain had been waxing poetic about came to life, wreaked havoc, and then exploded all over the place.

Pepper rubbed both hands over her face, smudging her makeup uncaringly. “So it’s for sure? The machine did that to him?”

Happy nodded. “Far as we can tell, yeah.”

“Okay… I don’t suppose either of you happened to get a degree in magical time manipulation devices that I don’t know about, hmm?”

Rhodey smiled a little and shook his head. “Sorry to tell you, but the only person I know of that might have a shot at figuring this out is currently playing dinosaur Star Wars in the next room.”

Pepper glanced over, watching Tony for a moment through the glass wall of the lab. She had brought him with her and got him settled in the other room with some toys so he didn’t have to watch the footage. “Yeah. That’s what I was afraid of.”

“You think Thor might be able to help?” Happy suggested, looking thoughtful.

Rhodey’s eyebrows rose as he considered it. “Maybe. This is his kind of thing, if it’s got magic involved in some way. He knows more about it than I do, anyway.”

“Let’s get him down here,” Pepper said, taking a deep breath and straightening her shoulders. “The sooner the better. I’ll take Tony back to our apartment. He probably shouldn’t be here for that, especially not if Thor needs to see the footage.”

* * *

Thor thought it was a prank at first. He watched the video feed and laughed, complimenting Rhodey on his attempts.

“Um, no, big guy. This isn’t my kind of prank. I’m more of a whoopee cushion on your chair kind of prankster, not a fancy video editing kind of prankster. This is legit.”

Thor was still smiling, though it was starting to fade. He glanced at the images on the screen again, paused at the point when Rhodey found Tony in the rubble and pulled him out. “Surely you jest.”

Happy shook his head while Pepper said, “Nope. That’s Tony. And we don’t know how it happened. You see any kind of magic going on there?”

Thor watched it again, much more closely, the reality and seriousness of the situation dawning on him. “And that truly is Tony? Not a decoy or a clone or some such thing?”

“Nope. He was the only other person still alive in that warehouse after the explosion, except for me.” Rhodey answered. “He remembers his life, he knows who we are, he even has the same mannerisms. It’s him. Just… younger.”

“The influence of magic is very likely. I’m not as familiar with magic as my mother and Loki were, he was always better at it than I.” Thor leaned in again, looking at one of the images of the machine just as it started to emit the blinding blue light, and then some of the parts of the machine that Rhodey had retrieved and spread out on a nearby lab table. “Perhaps additional consultation would be wise?”

“Well, you’re the only one I know that knows magic, unfortunately.” Rhodey said, folding his arms.

Thor brightened a little bit. “I’m familiar with one of your wizards here on Midgard. I met him during my search for my father.”

Happy’s eyes widened. “Wait, wizard?”

Rhodey’s did too. “Your dad was _here_?”

Pepper sounded mildly panicked, “Better question, how did we not know that there are apparently wizards on earth? Outside of Harry Potter, I mean.”

Thor just shrugged. “I’m given to understand that they are unknown on purpose.” He brightened further. “My Lady Jane has the brightest mind I know of, and she has been learning all she can of magic. I believe she will be very helpful indeed.”

Rhodey nodded in agreement. “That would be good, having a legit scientist in here to help us out. Aerospace engineering isn’t exactly gonna crack this case.”

“I will contact them both immediately.” Thor nodded at the three of them and left the lab, and they could hear his voice a moment later as he called Jane.

“FRIDAY, update on Tony?”

“He’s still asleep, Ms. Potts. I'll let you know the moment he wakes up.”

“Thanks. I don’t want him to feel abandoned.” Pepper looked at the mess of machine parts on the table and the data scrolling on one of the holoscreens. “I wish Bruce was here.”

Happy sighed and nodded. “Yeah, he’d probably know how to figure out some of this stuff. Four heads are better than three.”

“Not just that.” Rhodey added. “I know Tony misses Bruce. A lot.”

Pepper nodded. “It would be nice to just have him here for that reason, if nothing else.”

* * *

Thor was true to his word, arranging for Dr. Jane Foster and the Sorcerer Supreme, Dr. Stephen Strange to come to the Compound the next day. Rhodey met them in the lab.

“Dr. Foster. I’m really glad you came. There was talk floating around that you gave up the Midgardian life to go be a princess on Asgard.” Rhodey grinned and shot a look at Thor.

Jane snorted, though she still held Thor’s hand like she was going to die before letting go. “Please, who wants to be a princess when you can be a scientist?”

“You should get that on a t-shirt.” Rhodey held out his hand to Dr. Strange next. “Hi, James Rhodes. Thor tells me you’re a Sorcerer Supreme. You’ll have to forgive me if I have no idea what that means.”

“Long explanation, and one I sense we don’t have time for.” Strange replied.

Rhodey quirked an eyebrow. “What makes you say that?’

“The fact that you have the brightest medical mind and Sorcerer Supreme, one of the most promising minds in theoretical physics, and the actual god of thunder in this room makes me think that you either have trouble, or… no, there’s no or, you’re in trouble. Where’s Stark? Can’t he get you out of it?” Strange raised an eyebrow right back.

“Yeah, that’s the thing.” Rhodey sighed, crossing his arms loosely over his chest. “FRIDAY?”

The AI projected a live feed of Tony and Pepper’s living room onto a holoscreen for them all to see. Pepper was lying on the couch, watching a cartoon movie while Tony, in his kid-sized body, lay curled up against her, likewise enthralled with the movie.

They didn’t understand, Rhodey could see it, until Tony sat up and pointed at the screen, chattering something about Baymax being the best robot and he wanted one.

Jane’s eyes went huge, her jaw dropped, and Rhodey couldn’t help but smile a little as she looked at him.

“That’s Tony?!”

“Yeah.”

“Are you serious?” Strange had obviously tweaked to what was going on as well, and his attention sharpened. “That’s Stark?”

“How?!” Jane blurted out, looking as if her mind was spinning with the implications. “Are you sure it’s him?”

“As sure as we can be, yeah,” Rhodey confirmed, waving the holoscreen away and sitting down at the table with them. “And we need to figure out how to change him back. That’s where I’m hoping you three will come in.”

* * *

Pepper startled slightly in hers and Tony's kitchen, nearly spilling her afternoon coffee, when something tapped on the edge of the counter next to her. She looked down to see Tony standing here, coffee mug in his hand.

“You’re very sneaky, I didn’t even hear you." She said, ruffling his hair. "What are you up to?”

“Coffee please.” Tony said simply, holding up the mug.

Pepper was… well, perplexed. How was she supposed to handle this? Coffee wasn’t good for kids (it wasn’t that good for adults either, to be honest), but this was _Tony_. Did she even dare tell him no? The man mainlined caffeine like it was the source of his power.

“Um… I’m not sure that’s a good idea, honey.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re… all small now.”

He squinted at her, adorably suspicious. “You teased me about being small before.”

She choked out a laugh, recalling the time that she had been wearing heels while Tony had been barefoot, which made her an inch taller than him. She had teased him mercilessly about it, too, further encouraged by his very loud and only slightly sincere protests.

“That’s true, but you’re even smaller now. Almost pocket-sized, look at you!”

“I am not pocket-sized!” Tony protested, but he couldn’t quite glare the way he wanted with his lips tipping up in a smile. It was so outrageously _Tony_ that Pepper couldn’t stop herself from scooping him up and kissing all over his round-cheeked face. He giggled and tried to fend her off, eventually wrapping his arms around her neck and burying his face in her hair to escape.

She rubbed over his back, scratching very lightly with her nails and smiling at the way the little boy went boneless. Oh good, the same tricks worked on the small version as well as the big one. “Alright. I will agree to half a cup of coffee, but only once a day.”

“That’s almost nothing.” Tony pouted, still hidden in her hair.

“You’re smaller now, remember. So your tummy is tiny and can only handle a little coffee.”

“This sounds ‘spicious.”

Pepper giggled as she held onto him with one hand and poured a careful half cup of coffee into Tony’s mug with the other. “Take it or leave it, pal.”

Sitting back up, Tony made grabby hands at the mug. “Take it! I take it!”

“Thought you might. Maybe try sipping it, alright? I don’t need to see what Tony Stark’s five-year-old body does when it’s just chugged coffee.”

Tony just looked at her over the rim of the too-big mug, looking very pleased with himself, his eyes crinkled up slightly and twinkling. Then he apparently tasted the coffee, because he made a face. “What’s wrong with it?”

“What do you mean?” Pepper tasted her own coffee again, and found nothing amiss.

“It tastes wrong.” Tony looked crestfallen, staring into his mug sadly.

Pepper bit her lip to keep from chuckling, then reached for the glass container of sugar. She let about a spoonful pour into Tony’s coffee, then handed him a spoon. “There, try that. I have a hypothesis.”

He stirred the sugar in, looking skeptical. Normal-sized Tony didn’t often put sweetener in his coffee, only when he needed a sugar-rush burst of energy to keep himself going after being awake too long. But in a kid-sized body, she was willing to bet his taste buds had altered somewhat. 

Once the sugar had dissolved, Tony took a test sip. “Oh, that’s better.”

“You want a little bit of milk in it too? I bet that’ll help too.”

Tony agreed, and declared Pepper’s experiment a success when he tried it. “That was a good hypoth-sis. Very smart, Peppoh.”

Grinning, Pepper kissed his cheek. “Thank you, honey.”


	9. Hidden Depths of Fear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's no fix for Tony's predicament in the near future, and he comes face to face with his former teammates again with very unexpected results.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SPECTACULAR SKETCH ART FROM [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)

“I haven’t been this tired since grad school.”

Jane was slumped over a lab table, her voice muffled due to the fact that her face was buried in her arms. Strange didn’t say anything, but he was smirking slightly as he did… something or other with some kinda sparkler-wheel hand magic over one of the machine pieces.

Rhodey had to admit, he was exhausted too. They’d been in the lab for going on eighteen hours now, it was sometime in the wee hours of the morning, and they still hadn’t figured out the machine. Or, they’d figured out bits and pieces, and how a few fit together, but the overall purpose of it was still a mystery.

“Should I get you more coffee, my Jane?” Thor asked, not looking as tired as everyone else but still a little rough around the edges.

“Nah. It’s not waking me up, it’s just making me tired, but faster.”

Chuckling into the hand he had braced under his chin, Rhodey carefully stretched his legs out in front of himself, the braces whining slightly. He was starting to get the bad kind of sore, but he hated stopping before they had some kind of answers.

“So… anyone got any ideas? I’ll even take half-baked wild theories at this point.” He asked the room at large.

Jane lifted her head up, her puffy eyes squinting in the light. “He was messing with time, that much I’m certain about. But I haven’t got the faintest idea what he was trying to do with it.”

Thor nodded, hopping up to sit on one of the lab tables. “I agree. The bit of magic I’m familiar with does feel as if it’s supposed to be used to manipulate time.”

Strange dropped his hands, the golden wheelies around his hands sparking out as he sighed tiredly. “This is… the most dangerous hodge-podge of questionable science and magic that I’ve ever seen. I have no idea how that idiot did this, but more than that, I have no idea what he was trying to do with these components, or how Tony survived whatever happened to him.” 

Strange’s eyes met Rhodey’s, and it created a sinking sensation in his gut even before the sorcerer said the rest. “And until we can figure that out, there’s no way I’ll be able to help Tony.”

* * *

Pepper really didn’t want to do it. Not at all. In fact, she was rather fond of Happy’s suggestion that they take off for a few weeks, finding someplace remote to lie low so Tony was safe and away from the Compound while the scientist, the sorcerer, and the demigod tried to work out the problem.

It wasn’t practical, though. Pepper had to go to work, there wasn’t any getting around that, and she didn’t feel right about taking Tony somewhere new. His mind was already dealing with all kinds of upheaval, what with Tony remembering his whole life, but from the mental maturity of a child. She didn’t want to completely uproot him from everything familiar.

And that had led to the inevitable conclusion that the rest of the ex-Avengers had to be told. Thor had kept it a secret, at Rhodey’s request, but now that there wasn’t an immediate solution on the horizon, it was better to tell them rather than have them find out later.

So Pepper had talked to Tony about it, watching the emotions that crossed his little face. He couldn’t hide it like he did as an adult, so she saw the reluctance, fear, and even some anger on his small features. He had agreed, but he didn’t look happy about it. So rather than put it off for later, she suggested they go now. Tony had nodded, reaching for her hand, and they had walked together to the communal area, where FRIDAY said all four of the ex-Avengers were gathered and had been briefed on the situation.

Tony paused at the head of the hall into the communal space, looking down it apprehensively. “I don’t wanna go in there.”

“It’s the communal area, Tony, you remember?”

He nodded but held onto her hand a little tighter, moving in a little closer to her side. “Can we go somewhere else?”

Pepper crouched down in front of him and cupped his face in her hand, smiling at the way he immediately leaned into it. “We can after, okay? I just want you to see these people, talk to them for a few minutes so they can understand what happened to you, then we can go, alright?”

He bit his lip, those big Bambi eyes almost pleading, then finally nodded. “Okay.”

“Thank you, honey. You’re so brave. You can do this.” It was precious and heartbreaking, the way he took a deep breath and squared those small shoulders, as if he were preparing for battle.

Nobody should have to feel that way when facing people that used to be friends.

They entered the communal space, and all four turned towards them immediately. It was obvious that Steve, Natasha, and Clint had been skeptical, because their eyes widened when they saw Tony. Thor didn’t look as surprised, but there was still an air of faint wonder about him, as if he’d still been slightly disbelieving until he actually saw Tony in person.

“Holy cow.” Steve murmured, standing up from where he’d been sitting on one of the yellow leather couches with Thor. “It’s true.”

Pepper felt Tony press in close to her side, all but clinging to her leg once they came to a stop. She could read the shock on Natasha’s face as she stared at Tony, her lips parted as if her jaw had actually dropped. Clint stood up as well, he’d been sitting in the kitchen with Natasha, and the two joined Steve and Thor in the living room, still staring at Tony.

Pepper rested a hand on the top of Tony’s head, lightly ruffling the loose dark curls as he shifted further behind her leg. “Do you remember them, Tony?”

He nodded, but didn’t otherwise move, watching the Avengers with one wide eye peeking around her leg.

[](http://imgbox.com/QwrSGgiY)

“Do you want to say hi?”

He shook his head, his little hands clenching tightly into her dress pants as he buried his face in the back of her thigh.

Steve, Natasha, Thor, and Clint exchanged looks. Then Steve shrugged his shoulders and stepped forward. “Hi, Tony. You remember me?”

Tony had jumped when Steve spoke, and as Pepper looked down at him in concern, she realized the little boy was shaking. Crouching down next to him, she cupped his face in her hand, nearly falling over when he pressed in close to her.

“Honey, what’s wrong?”

He just shook his head, his big brown eyes darting between Steve and the other Avengers, and suddenly Pepper placed the emotion she saw on his face. He was _terrified_.

She lowered her voice as she wrapped an arm around him. “Sweetheart… are you scared?”

Tony swallowed, then nodded, moving even closer. “They’re scary,” He whispered, still shaking. “They don’t like me.”

They didn’t say anything, but Pepper could still sense their surprise. When she shot a glance at Steve, the shock was clearly written on his face. She was feeling some of that shock herself. She knew all too well how hard things had been, but to hear Tony confessing his fear like this, so plainly in that small, scared voice... 

Thor was the first to speak.

“There’s no reason to be scared, little one,” He insisted, coming forward. “We are your comrades in arms.”

Tony flinched when Thor started forward, and when the demigod didn’t stop, he actually flung himself away from Pepper and stumbled over his own feet trying to run away, crying out in fear.

“No!” He ran around the edge of the dining table and hid behind one of the chairs, his hands up protecting his throat.

Pepper and Thor looked at each other, baffled, before Pepper slowly approached Tony again. He was huddling on the floor with his knees against his chest, his arms resting on them with his hands on his shoulders. He looked up at Pepper with wide, fearful eyes, and she could see the beginnings of tears in them.

“What’s wrong, honey?” Pepper asked, shifting to sit on the floor so she could pull Tony into her lap. He went willingly and rested his head against her, sighing when she wrapped her arms around him. It was the first time he’d relaxed even a little since they had come into the room and seen the rest of the Avengers standing there, waiting for them. “Why are you afraid of Thor? Can you tell me?”

Tony plucked nervously at the hem of his shirt, shooting a frightened glance at the demigod. “He’ll hurt me again.”

Pepper was as shocked as Thor was, and she asked. “What? When did he hurt you?” while Thor insisted, “I’ve never harmed him!”

Tony shuddered and huddled closer to Pepper, his hands coming up to cover his throat again as he whispered, “He grabbed my neck and picked me up. It hurted. I couldn’t breathe.”

Pepper felt sick, and she fixed an enraged glare on Thor. “You did what?!”

Thor opened his mouth, starting to deny it, then suddenly stopped as his face paled, and as his gazed dipped between her and Tony. “I—I did not intend… I’d forgotten.”

“You picked my fiancé up by his throat and choked him?” Pepper nearly whispered, a trace of something deadly in her tone.

Thor looked appropriately ashamed and, she was pleased to note, just a little bit afraid.

It took some effort to rein in her fury, an anger she’d hoped she would never have reason to feel again, but Pepper managed and carefully got to her feet, holding Tony in her arms. “We will talk about this later. But right now, it’s obviously for the best that he is nowhere near the four of you right now.”

She stalked past them without another word, and they very wisely let her go. All but flinging the door they’d come through off its hinges, Pepper took a deep breath to calm herself down on the other side, and rubbed her hand over Tony’s back. 

“It’s okay, honey. You don't ever have to go back in there again. You’re alright, and I’ll take care of you, okay?”

Tony nodded, his head resting on her shoulder, and she could feel the way his body loosened with relief now that he was away from his _teammates_.

“Okay.”


	10. Uncomfortable Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nobody is comfortable with how Tony's brief meeting with the ex-Avengers went, or with the number of realizations that spring forth from it.
> 
> WITH MORE GLORIOUS ART FROM [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)
> 
> Full color art can be seen [on Tumblr](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) and in [Chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60447559)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter fills my Ladies of Marvel bingo squre W5 – "Come dance with me." "But it's raining."

“We know anything more about this bag of crazy?” Rhodey waved a hand at one of the stills of the bad guy projected on one of the holoscreens as he took his phone out of his pocket, seeing an SOS text from Pepper.

“Julian Harmon. Professor Infinity. Yes, we are all _very_ impressed with his supervillain name.” Jane let the sarcasm drip from her words as she pulled up a profile on the man. “Unfortunately, his moniker doesn’t exactly give us much to go by.”

“What were you hoping for?” Rhodey grinned at her. “Aquaman? Batman?”

“Hey, those are legit superhero names, they tell you everything you need to know!”

“Do we know anything other than his unimpressive villain name?”

“He was a teacher at a community college in Ohio. Physics and Applied Sciences. Probably how he built that monstrosity.” She sent a disdainful gaze at the table full of parts from the machine.

Stifling a sigh, Rhodey slid his phone back in his pocket. “Sorry, I’ve gotta run. Anything I can do for you, anything you need?”

“Coffee.” Jane replied instantly. “And Thor, if you see him. Oh! How did it go, Tony meeting them? Pepper said something about it last night.”

Rhodey shook his head. “Not well. Pepper’s ready to throw them out, I’m gonna go see if I can talk her down. I’ll send Thor in if I see him.”

“Thanks!” Jane called after him, and he caught the expression of concern on her face before he turned the corner.

* * *

Steve was on his second punching bag when Natasha came in, though he didn’t look at her. He knew it was her by the way he could barely hear her footsteps, the faint scent of her shampoo. He kept punching, unwilling to talk, ignoring the way his hands and wrists hurt more with every strike.

Natasha settled herself on the padded bench against the wall, silent for a minute or two, as if she were waiting to give him a chance to speak first. Finally she took his silence for what it was, and talked.

“That really threw you, didn’t it?” Her voice was quiet, as it so often was, nearly inaudible over the sound of Steve’s fists pummeling the punching bag.

“It didn’t throw you?” He grunted, not pausing in his efforts, his words punctuated by punches. “That kid… Tony thinks we hate him, Nat. That we’re mean to him.”

She didn’t reply, and at last Steve stuttered to a stop, his chest heaving as he panted. Sweat was dripping down his face and his abused knuckles were starting to swell.

“You wanna know the worst part of it? The more I think about it, the more I realize that he’s got no reason to believe otherwise. That Pepper was right, when she put the fear of God into us a couple months ago. I didn’t believe it, I didn’t want to see it, but think about it.” 

He resumed his punching, his words emphasized by hard impacts of fist against leather. 

“We don’t act like we like him. We don’t treat him nicely. We made him feel unwelcome in his own home, to the point that he doesn’t even come into the communal areas anymore, not even after our lackluster attempts to be nicer. We constantly put him down and criticize him. We’ve blamed him for every wrong thing that has ever happened in the past six years, refusing to acknowledge that just because we don’t see the hurt on his face, it doesn’t mean it isn’t there. And on top of that, we’ve expected him to fix every single one of our problems and clean up all of our messes with absolutely no thanks or recognition, and anytime he doesn’t do exactly that? We call him selfish, accuse him of being unreasonable and irresponsible, and go behind his back to betray him at the first opportunity.”

Natasha still didn’t speak. She had her arms folded tightly across her chest, and she was staring at the floor, her mouth set in a tense line.

Steve stopped again, weaving slightly on his feet, then shook his head and sighed. “You know, I spent most of my life hating bullies, hating what they did to the people that they picked on just because they were bigger and thought it was okay because they could get away with it.” He snorted in disgust. “I’ve turned into exactly the kind of person I always hated, and I didn’t even see it until today.”

Turning on his heel, he stalked away towards the locker room, leaving a silent Natasha alone behind him.

* * *

Pepper was standing in the doorway of the sliding door that led out onto the private patio behind hers and Tony’s suite. Rain was pouring down in thick sheets, pattering onto the wet grass and concrete, and Tony was right out there in it, wearing brand new bright red rain boots. He was jumping in puddles with all the happiness and enthusiasm of a child, giggling when he got a particularly big splash. He waved back at Pepper, the hood and shoulders of his jacket soaked from the rain, but if he was cold, he didn’t seem to mind.

[](http://imgbox.com/KaUBCOr0)

“Puddle jumping, huh?” Rhodey asked, propping himself up next to Pepper and smiling as he saw Tony. “Cure-all for a bad day?”

“Hey, it’s working.” Pepper replied, leaning her shoulder against the edge of the doorway. “He’s happy as a clam.”

“He deserves it, poor kid. I had FRIDAY show me the footage.”

“I can’t believe he never told me.” Pepper sighed, folding her arms. “I shouldn't be surprised, I know he keeps all his hurts inside, he always has, but something like that…”

“I know,” Rhodey sighed too. “I’m getting real damn tired of always underestimating him. He’s just such a butthead when he wants to be, and I forget what he’s like when all his walls are down.”

“Everybody does. Nobody suspected a thing when he was dying of palladium poisoning, but now when I look back at it, it was glaringly obvious. The same thing happened after New York, he had symptoms of PTSD for months, but it took JARVIS to figure it out when Tony thought he was dying because of a panic attack. Tony is a proficient illusionist when he tries, he’s got it mastered so that nobody looks anywhere but where he wants." She glanced out at Tony, watching him drag the toes of his boots through puddles, studying the ripple patterns before stomping in with both feet. "That’s why I feel so horrible for considering this a little bit of a gift.”

Rhodey looked at her in surprise. “Really?”

“Yeah. Just… being able to really see how he feels. What he thinks. He hides so much of his pain, and I even thought before all this happened that it wasn’t healthy. I don’t want him to stay like this, I want my Tony back, but as long as he’s like this… maybe it’s a good thing. He can't hide it all behind masks and walls like this. So maybe once he’s back to himself, he won’t have to keep so much of it buried anymore.”

The two fell into silence as they watched Tony, now crouching down and watching a few bubbles that he’d created with his jumping as they floated in a puddle. He was grinning as he watched, occasionally reaching down to poke at one, giggling every time one popped. Once they were all gone, he stood up again, getting ready for more puddle jumping, but then he spotted something at the edge of the cement patio and squealed.

“Peppoh! Wo-dey! It’s a _worm_!”

“Gross!” Pepper called back, at the same time Rhodey shouted, “Eat it!” Tony stuck his tongue out at Rhodey and amused himself for a minute watching the worm, then went back to his jumping and splashing with gusto.

“I never knew he talked like that,” Pepper said quietly as she watched him.

“Like what?”

She imitated the way the little boy pronounced their names. “Peppoh, Wo-dey.”

“It’s called Rhotacism. I googled it last night. He told me about it once, I think, when we were at MIT. Something about Howard making him see speech therapists as far back as he could remember, trying to get rid of it.”

Pepper’s stomach twisted with anger. “I swear, every time I hear something new about Howard, my desire to go back in time and punch him right in the dick increases.”

Rhodey laughed quietly at that and reached out to squeeze her shoulder. “You know, I 100% believe you’d do that.”

“Peppoh!” Tony came dashing over and held out his hands to her. “Come dance wif me!”

“But it’s raining! I’ll get all wet.”

“You can use my jacket!” Tony insisted, going to work on the zipper down the front.

“No, no, keep that on. It won’t fit me anyway.”

Those big, brown Bambi eyes were looking up at her so soulfully, and he didn’t even have to say anything for Pepper to know how disappointed he was.

“Oh, go on and dance in the rain with him.” Rhodey urged, making shooing motions at her. “It’s not that cold, and you can’t just turn your fiancé down when he asks you to dance.”

Tony beamed up at Rhodey, then turned hopefully to Pepper.

She couldn’t stay strong against that face, but she hooked her arm through Rhodey’s as she stepped out into the rain. “Don’t think you’re escaping this either, troublemaker. Come on!”

So to the tune of Tony’s delighted giggles, Pepper and Rhodey joined him in the rain, and got soaked to the skin as they danced and twirled and jumped in puddles and caught raindrops on their tongues.


	11. Heavy Clouds of Guilt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pepper and Tony order him more clothes, and Clint is disturbed to find out how Tony sees him.

The next morning, Pepper smiled as she helped Tony tug a shirt over his head, his hair flat against his head for a moment before the collar of the shirt popped down in place, at which the curls immediately sprang up again. She _loved_ it. He hadn’t worn his hair longer than an inch or two in years, and she had to admit, she really missed playing with his longer hair. “You know, we should probably get you a few more clothes. So you don’t have to wear the same ones over and over.”

“Can I pick?” Tony asked, wiggling his arms up and through the sleeves.

“Of course you can, honey.”

Tony cheered and wiggled, doing a little happy dance before putting on his pants, and Pepper found it so cute that they immediately settled down with a tablet to do some online shopping, the little boy curled into her side. Tony was just as particular about his clothes as a little kid as he was as an adult, detailing his preferences with a great deal of certainty. He wasn’t so much into the generally childish clothes, with the cartoon pictures or extremely bright colors, but the more neutral colors and “cool” screen printing had his stamp of approval (he would soon be the proud owner of several very small band t-shirts).

“I need one of those,” Tony said as they scrolled through, pointing at one of the images.

“This kind?” Pepper clicked on the picture of a boy wearing a polo shirt.

“Yes, with the buttons.”

“Okay, what color?” She pulled up the options and ran her finger over them.

“Green!” Tony exclaimed excitedly, “Like Wo-dey!”

“Does Rhodey have a green shirt like that?” Pepper asked as she picked the right size and added it to the cart.

“Yep, when you got fire inside you.”

Realizing that had to be Extremis, Pepper made a bit of a face. Those had been a few bad days. “Okay, green shirt for Rhodey. What else?”

“A white shirt for you!”

Pepper glanced down at herself. “I’m not wearing a white shirt.” In fact, she was wearing a light gray dress, since she had a meeting later on the SI floors and didn’t want to change.

“White is your favorite.” Tony climbed onto her lap and snuggled in. “You got lotsa white.”

Glancing over her shoulder and into the walk-in closet, Pepper had to admit… he had a point. White was definitely the most popular color on her side, followed by black and shades of gray.

“Okay, white shirt for me.”

They picked out a tiny white button-down shirt and some blue jean shorts, then Tony got all excited and pointed at something in the “suggested items” sidebar, a boy wearing dress pants and a white shirt.

“And a suit for Happy!”

Pepper couldn’t help but giggle a little bit. “You want a suit to wear for Happy?”

“Yes! With a black tie!”

The mental image of a tiny Tony wearing an itty-bitty black suit was absolutely adorable, so Pepper searched until she found just the right thing in his size.

“Anything else?”

Tony tapped his chin, his eyes even going a little squinty as he apparently thought about it very hard. “Iron Man colors?”

With a grin, Pepper could barely hold back her glee as she typed “iron man kid clothes” into the search bar.

Tony’s eyes went so wide with wonder it was a miracle they didn’t pop right out.

“I need all of them.” He whispered reverently, and while Pepper didn’t let him really get all of them… she did let him get far more Iron Man shirts, pajamas, shoes, socks, and toys than he would ever need.

_We’ll just save them,_ she reasoned to herself. _Someday we’ll have kids, and it will be adorable to have Iron Man clothes for them that their dad wore._

With a warm ball of happiness in her stomach that she wasn’t letting herself look too closely at just yet, Pepper put in the orders for everything and took them both to the kitchen to get breakfast.

* * *

Tony had become the hot topic that nobody was talking about, and as Clint, Steve, and Natasha sat around the island in the communal kitchen, the events of the day before hung over their heads like a dense thundercloud. All of them were thinking about it, and knew the others were too, but it seemed like a taboo subject. Especially since Steve’s knuckles still showed faint signs of how many punching bags he’d gone through the night before, rather than sleeping.

“Lemme give it a try,” Clint finally suggested, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” Steve said, sounding defeated as he looked at his untouched plate of eggs, bacon, and toast. “Maybe we should all steer clear for a while.”

Clint glanced at him, then at Natasha. “I know this is going to sound insensitive, but I’m the only one here that hasn’t attacked him in one way or another. Aren’t I?”

The heavy, tense silence spoke volumes.

“Yeah, so if anyone has a chance, I do. Besides, I’m good with kids.” With a grin, Clint left his half-eaten breakfast behind, obviously intending to go find Tony right then.

“He’s making a mistake.” Natasha murmured, barely audible in the large space. She wasn’t eating either, staring at her mug of tea and peanut butter toast without touching them.

“Probably,” Steve sighed, poking at his eggs. “But there’s no point in trying to stop him.”

They fell into silence again. Long minutes passed, and finally Natasha pushed her plate away. “I’m not hungry. You still going to talk to Thor?”

Steve nodded. He’d passed Thor in the hall last night, and the demigod had told him that Jane Foster, Dr. Strange, and himself were trying to figure out the machine that had apparently deaged Tony. Figuring that he might as well find out what he could, Steve had arranged to go down to the lab later, both to try and learn more about what happened and why Tony had reacted to them the way he had. And he didn’t want to turn up in the lab unexpectedly. Not if Tony might be there.

He didn’t ever want a repeat of yesterday.

“Let me know if you want me to come too.” Natasha took care of her untouched food and dishes, then left Steve alone in the communal kitchen.

Knowing he needed to eat, but not feeling the slightest bit hungry, Steve piled the cold eggs and bacon onto the toast and made a sandwich, forcing himself to take a bite and trying not to think about what would happen when Clint found Tony.

* * *

It took Clint a good half hour to track Tony down. FRIDAY was currently not speaking to any of the reinstated Avengers, and it took him going to all of Tony’s old haunts before he finally located the kid in the garage. He was sitting in the backseat of one of his fancy convertibles, a Rubik’s cube in his hands while music played on the radio. Happy was on the other end of the garage, talking to one of the security guards, and he didn’t seem to have noticed Clint coming in.

“Hey, Tony. Whatcha up to, bud?”

Tony jumped and dropped the Rubik’s cube, then looked around. Once he spotted Clint, the kid watched him warily, then his eyes darted to Happy.

Leaning over the low car door, Clint scooped up the Rubik’s cube and handed it back to him, smiling. He was good at this kid thing, he could get Tony to warm up to him. He just needed to find something to bond over, kids opened up easy if you paid attention to them.

Tony took the cube tentatively, like he was half-expecting it to be snatched away. But once he had it in both hands, he didn’t try to solve it. He just held it in his lap, not looking at Clint.

“You ever solved one of those before? I never did. Too tricky for me.” 

Tony didn’t answer.

“I used to like throwing rocks when I was a kid, to see what I could hit. I had pretty good aim, even then.”

Still nothing.

Okay. He could handle that. Just try a different tactic. With kids, you just had to find the right thing to talk about, something that interested them.

“You like cars?” An obvious question, of course Tony liked cars. They were sitting in a garage that had its own section dedicated just to Tony Stark’s collection, row upon row of flashy, expensive vehicles. “Which car is your favorite?”

Tony lifted his head, but just to look towards Happy. Then he looked down at his lap again.

Okay, Clint had to admit wasn’t sure where to go with this next. This version of Tony was completely different than the Tony he knew. The Tony he knew was always talking, the center of attention, obnoxious and contentious, showing off and putting in his two cents no matter if anyone wanted it or not, callous and arrogant and always with something to say.

This quiet little kid that wouldn’t even look at him was nothing like the Tony Stark he knew. 

Clint considered getting in the car, just sitting with the kid until he felt more comfortable. He didn’t have a chance to, though.

“You don’t like me.” Tony finally said, quietly but surely.

“What do you mean? Sure I like you.”

“You’re mean to me. You said it was all my fault.”

Clint’s brows furrowed in confusion. “Said what was your fault?”

He saw the way Tony’s hands suddenly shook, tightening around the Rubik’s cube. “My Wo-dey. And the Raft.”

It hit Clint like a punch to the gut, realizing what Tony meant. And another blow altogether to realize that, well… the kid wasn’t wrong.

He had indeed blamed Tony for the Raft. Still did. And he had blatantly implied, in that angry, bitter parting shot onboard the floating prison, that Tony was also at fault for Rhodes getting hit and paralyzed during the airport battle.

Shame washed through Clint on the heels of his shock, and it made him feel sick. All of a sudden, as he looked down at this little kid that was visibly hunching into himself like he was afraid and needed protection, he realized the scope of his own actions. The blame he'd placed on anyone but himself. The horrid, hurtful words he'd thrown without a second thought, and not just on the Raft. He'd been lashing out, specifically and pointedly at Tony, as revenge for everything that had gone wrong. It was a sharp slap in the face to see it so clearly now, and to finally start to grasp the wrongness of what he'd done.

“No, Tony, I… I don’t blame you for that, I…”

“You don’t like me.” The little boy said again, with the briefest glance up at him. His words were just as quiet as before, and with just as much conviction as he ducked his head down again, staring at his lap. “You never liked me.”

“What’s going on?”

Happy’s voice was gruff, which wasn’t unusual, but his expression was also cold and suspicious as he looked at Clint.

“Happy, can we go inside?” Tony’s voice was still quiet and small, and Clint could see the pleading expression on the little boy's face as he looked up at his former bodyguard.

“Yeah, of course, kid. Come on.” Happy lifted Tony out of the car, and went to put him down, but Tony tightened his arms around Happy’s neck, shaking his head. “Okay, alright, I can carry you. You okay?”

Tony nodded, but didn’t say anything, and shifted to hold his Rubik’s cube against his chest and lay his head on Happy’s shoulder.

Happy shot Clint another one of those cold, suspicious looks, eyeing him up and down like he was checking him for weapons. “What did you do?”

A hell of a lot, it turned out. “I… we just… talked.” 

The big man looked like he was on the brink of hauling Clint in for questioning, but Tony looked up at him. “Can we go inside?”

“Yeah, right, sure. We’re going right now. We’ll come play with the cars later.” Glaring at Clint once more for good measure, Happy turned and headed for the door, Tony held securely in his arms.

Feeling off-balance and sick, Clint stayed where he was for a few minutes. Then, under a weighty fog of guilt, he went looking for Rhodes.


	12. Perspective and Platypuses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dr. Strange explains why Tony reacted to the ex-Avengers the way he did, and Rhodey brings Tony a couple presents.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU'RE SO LUCKY, BECAUSE YOU GET TWO AMAZING ARTS TODAY BY [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)!!!
> 
> Full color art can be seen [on Tumblr](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) and in [Chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60447559)

Steve passed Clint on his way to the lab that afternoon, opening his mouth to say hi, but the words stilled on his tongue when he saw the closed off, pinched look on his teammate’s face.

Something was bugging the guy, and Steve knew not to push. He continued on to the lab, wondering what had happened, if it had involved Tony, and if things were better or worse.

“Hey, you just missed Clint.” Rhodey greeted Steve when he came in the room, standing around a bank of computers and holoscreens with Drs. Strange and Foster.

“What was Clint doing down here?”

“Moping, for the most part. Guess he found out exactly why he and Tony haven’t been jiving lately, and he wasn’t real pleased with himself.”

Steve’s eyebrows furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“I’ll let the doc explain it,” Rhodey nodded towards the other three gathered around a holoscreen. “Hey, Strange. Tell Steve what you just told Clint.”

Looking slightly irritated at the distraction, Strange glanced at him. “Really? Am I the only person in the Compound that has the slightest idea what’s going on?”

“No, but you explain it well.” Dr. Foster said, tweaking something on the holoscreen.

Rolling his eyes, Strange stepped back and approached Steve. “Fine, but I’m not explaining this again, so everyone listen.”

“Mm hmm.” Dr. Foster hummed, not paying him the slightest bit of attention as she pulled up another holoscreen and started working on that one too.

Strange rolled his eyes and looked at Steve. “Okay. Let me guess, Tony didn’t react well to you either?”

Steve blinked at the abruptness of Strange’s question. “Uh, no. We saw him yesterday, but he was… he was afraid of us.” He shook his head at the memory. “Wouldn’t come near us, said we didn’t like him, and he even ran away when Thor tried to go near him.” Steve glanced over at Thor, but he was having a murmured conversation with Jane, the both of them gesturing to the holoscreen.

“Yes, that’s what Mr. Odinson said, and Mr. Barton as well, once we coaxed it out of him. Have you figured out why, yet?” Strange looked irritated, like having to explain this was a waste of his time.

Steve ground his teeth a little, forcing himself not to get angry. “No, otherwise I wouldn’t be down here talking to you.”

Strange smirked a little bit. “Fine. Here’s what I suspect. When Tony was deaged, he retained all of his memories. And as far as we can hypothesize, the rest of who he was is still in there. But he’s feeling, and thinking and reacting, like a child, because he’s in a child’s body with a child’s brain. He can’t process the kind of complex thoughts and emotions that an adult can, so everything is stripped down to the core of what it is. Such as his relationships with people, for example. Consider the way he is with Colonel Rhodes, Miss Potts, Mr. Hogan. They have been closest to him for the majority of his life, his friends, his family. The way he truly thinks and feels about them is reflected in his behavior with them.”

Steve nodded, recalling the way Tony had been clinging to Pepper when she’d brought him to see the Avengers, depending on her for protection and comfort.

It was a sharp, unpleasant realization for him when he recalled the fear and distrust in Tony’s eyes when he’d been looking around at the people that used to be his teammates.

“So… the way he is with me and the others?” Steve asked quietly, already afraid of the answer.

“You might want to reconsider everything you ever thought you knew about Tony Stark,” Strange said gravely, looking Steve right in the eye. “Because I sure as hell never would have guessed how easily and deeply hurt he is, behind all those masks and walls he’s so good at putting up as an adult. In fact, given what Colonel Rhodes has told me, it sounds like Tony even got started on that early. He probably hasn’t been in a situation in which he could be completely himself, with no filters or masks, since he was a child. And that’s what we’ve got on our hands.”

With a heavy sigh, Steve sat down in one of the wheeled chairs parked at a worktable and put his head in his hands. It was everything he’d feared and more. Confirmation of just how much the Avengers, and he, personally, had hurt Tony. He felt sick with shame to realize that it had taken this, Tony being deaged and biologically forced to reveal how he really felt, to make them all see what they’d done to him.

“It’s harsh, I know.” Strange said quietly, something a little like compassion creeping into his voice. “But it’s truthful. And sometimes the truth hurts like a bitch.”

* * *

“Peppoh, look!”

She leaned over to look into the walk-in closet, where Tony had been trying on his newly delivered clothes in front of the big mirror. And she laughed when she caught sight of him.

He was wearing the white button-down shirt that he said was to match her, and some black skinny jeans… and a pair of Pepper’s high heels. Slipping and tottering and clunking around, he shuffled his way to the door of the closet, arms out for balance and giggling.

[ ](http://imgbox.com/CPJmhrC7)

“Tony, you are absolutely ridiculous!” Scooping him right up out of the shoes, Pepper laughed and kissed his cheeks, loving the way he melted into her arms at the show of affection. He wrapped his arms around her neck and returned the kisses tenfold.

“I—love—your—fweckles.” He said between kisses, and Pepper had to close her eyes for a second. He said that all the time, when he was his adult self, and a sudden, sharp stab of yearning went through her. She missed him. She absolutely adored him like this, as an adorable, precocious little boy, but she missed her fiancé. 

“Guess what,” She said, trying to distract herself from the kinds of feelings that she couldn’t really handle right now. “Rhodey is here.”

Tony gasped, “Wo-dey?!” and wiggled to get down, running into the closet. Pepper pulled herself together while he changed into his green Rhodey shirt, and managed a real smile when he came back out and reached for her hand.

* * *

Rhodey was waiting in the living room, and he grinned when Tony and Pepper came out of the bedroom, his hand in hers. It was adorable.

“Wo-dey! I’m wearing a shirt like you!”

“Oh yeah?”

“Apparently you wore a green polo shirt like this during the Extremis debacle.” Pepper filled him in, and Rhodey nodded, rolling his eyes a little as he smiled.

“Sure did. Of course he’d remember that. C’mere, Tones, I got you something.”

The little boy gasped with delight, his eyes big and shining. “Presents?!” He scrambled towards Rhodey, climbing right into his lap, bouncing and wiggling with excitement. “I got presents?!”

“Yeah, you got presents. I dunno if they’re as exciting as you’re hoping, but they made me laugh, so here ya go.” Rhodey put the two simply wrapped packages in Tony’s hands, smiling as the little boy ripped into the first one with enthusiasm.

The second he identified the contents, he laughed so hard he fell off Rhodey's lap. “Peppoh! Wo-dey got me War Machine underwear!”

“What?!” Pepper exclaimed, coming over to look. She burst out laughing too, because sure enough, Tony was sorting through several pairs of little boy underwear with various War Machine patterns on them. “Rhodey, are you serious?”

“Of course I am! He said he didn’t like the Batman ones.” Rhodey tapped on the other package. “This one too, Tony.”

Still giggling at his new underwear, Tony tore the paper off the next box and opened it up.

“Socks?” He questioned, holding up a pair of them.

“Yep. Pepper told me you got outfits to match me and her and Happy, so I thought I’d get you some themed socks too.” He pointed out the pattern on the little pair of blue socks. “You know what those are?”

Tony squinted at the curved red shapes. “No?”

“They’re peppers.”

Across the room, Pepper snorted as she tried to hold back a laugh, and Tony’s eyes widened. “Oh! Peppers! For my Pepper!” He giggled, then immediately grabbed the next pair, red with a gold pattern. “Iron Man! For me!”

“That’s right. Keep going, I got you a bunch.”

“Smileys for Happy! And _robots!_ ” Tony was giggling even harder, comparing the two different sets of robot socks before picking up the next one, green with lumpy brown shapes. “What are these ones, Wo-dey?”

Rhodey grinned. “Those are platypuses.” 

Giggling so hard the pile of socks were starting to fall off his lap, Tony started tugging at the platypus socks, trying to separate them. “I wanna put them on!”

“Here, hold on, they’ve got one of those plastic things.” Rhodey pulled his keys out of his pocket and used the tiny scissors on his keychain pocket knife to cut the plastic security tag, and watched as Tony jammed his feet into the socks. 

[](http://imgbox.com/EcVn7r8K)

He wiggled his toes, giggling at the way the platypus shapes distorted, then scooted off Rhodey’s lap and ran to Pepper, showing off his new socks. 

“They’ve got platypuses on them!” Tony gushed, wobbling in place as he stood on one foot and turned the other this way and that.

“I love them!” Pepper was smiling, but Rhodey could see that something was off. Happy came in just then, catching Tony’s attention and giving Rhodey a chance to check on Pepper.

“Rough morning?” He asked in an undertone as Tony showed all of his socks to Happy.

“Just miss him. Big him.” Pepper whispered back, her eyes going a little red as she tried to hold back tears.

Rhodey wrapped an arm around her shoulders, giving her a squeeze. “We’ll figure it out, okay? One way or another, we’ll get him back.”

She let her head rest on his shoulder for a second, sighing. “Yeah. Thanks, Rhodey.”

“I’ve got him this morning, okay? You go have some you-time.”

“I’ve got some SI stuff to do, actually. But thanks.”

Kissing Pepper on the forehead and giving her a smile, Rhodey approached Tony and Happy.

“Hey, how about us boys go scrounge up some breakfast?”

“Pancakes?” Tony asked hopefully, his hands full of his new socks.

“I think I can manage that. And Happy can rescue them if I screw them up, he’s good in the kitchen. Leave your socks and stuff there, I’ll help you put them away later.”

Nodding and scooting off the couch, Tony ran ahead, talking excitedly about pancakes.


	13. A Lot To Apologize For

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and the others find out about the circumstances that led to Tony's deaging.

Something was bothering Steve. And he couldn’t put his finger on what it was. It had been lurking in the back of his brain for what felt like days, like he’d forgotten something or misplaced something.

He was pacing around the Compound, with no path or destination in mind. He was just wandering restlessly, unable to settle to anything, and currently he was walking past the science lab that Bruce and Tony shared. Had shared. Before Bruce had disappeared.

Jane Foster was coming out of the lab, and she smiled and lifted a hand in greeting as she passed him. Steve smiled back and kept walking, still trying to figure out what was bothering him, when his enhanced hearing caught a sound coming out of the lab right before the door closed. 

It had to have been something of the Captain lingering in him, even though it had been two and a half years since he’d dropped the shield and walked away. The moment he heard an exclamation of pain, one of his teammates in trouble, his head was turning, and he found the source of it instantly.

Rhodey saw him coming through the holoscreen in front of him, and the video clip he was watching paused. Before it was waved away, Steve caught a glimpse of what was on the screen, multiple angles of the same thing. Tony, zip-tied to a chair set in a concrete floor, his face a mess of bruises, swelling, and bleeding cuts. He was hunched over, the lines of his body tight while his face contorted in pain, and if Steve had to bet on it, he’d have bet that cracked ribs were the source of it.

“What happened?” He asked in shock before he could think about it, his gaze falling to Rhodey.

Rhodey had that expression on his face, the one that was impossible to read, even for Natasha, but Steve would swear that he’d caught a flash of disappointment before he turned into a sphinx.

“It happened just before Tony got deaged.”

Though he’d only caught a glimpse of it, the footage he’d seen seemed burned into the back of his eyelids, and Steve couldn’t stop seeing Tony’s face, bruised and bloody and twisted in pain.

“How did he… who—”

“The psycho that kidnapped him.” Rhodey answered simply. “He had a buncha goons with him.”

Steve felt like the world had tipped under his feet. “Tony was kidnapped?” How had he not _known_?

“Yeah. He was. And they beat him up pretty bad before we could figure out where they’d taken him.”

And then all of a sudden it clicked. Steve realized what it was that had been bugging him, the thing he’d forgotten.

He hadn’t had any idea how or why Tony had been deaged. Thor, Pepper, and Rhodey, they never said. Just that it had happened. And, Steve realized with a rush of guilt, he had never asked. Never even wondered.

The sound of the lab door opening distracted him, and he looked over his shoulder to see Natasha and Clint coming in. 

“You okay?” Natasha asked, and Steve knew the two of them had probably been following him. She tended to do that when she was worried about him, and Clint was all but glued to her hip nowadays.

Steve nodded, though he wasn’t at all certain about it. He turned his attention back to Rhodey, feeling the two ex-SHIELD agents come up behind him.

“How long was he gone?” He asked, and he could hear the roughness in his voice.

Rhodey’s gaze flicked between the three of them briefly. “We finally tracked him down after about twelve hours. They’d taken him when he left the hotel he and Pepper were spending the weekend at.”

The weekend? Tony and Pepper had been gone at least overnight, and then Tony had gone missing for an entire day, and Steve hadn’t even known?

He could feel the tips of his ears going hot with shame. “What… what did they do to him?”

Rhodey had gone unreadable again, his dark eyes focused on Steve with an intensity that was almost uncomfortable.

“You sure you wanna know?

Steve didn’t want to know. He really, really didn’t. But… he needed to.

“Show me.” He finally said, meeting Rhodey’s eyes.

“All of us.” Natasha added, her face carefully blank, and though Clint didn’t nod or say anything at all, he also didn’t move.

So Rhodey looked between the three of them, his somber expression unreadable, and Steve had to work hard not to twitch or fidget under that gaze. Then finally Rhodey nodded. “You want Thor to see it too?”

“He hasn’t yet?”

Rhodey shook his head. “Just the last parts, with the machine.”

“Let’s wait for Thor.” Natasha answered, and Clint stepped away to pull his phone out, obviously calling the demigod.

Thor joined them a few minutes later, smiling at them all before he picked up on the atmosphere in the room.

“You requested my presence?”

Steve nodded, but he didn’t have a chance (or the inclination, really) to explain.

The footage came up again on the holoscreen, earlier than the clip Steve had seen. Tony was still in the chair, but he wasn’t hurt. With a quick gesture, Rhodey let it play out for them, and it was every bit as awful as Steve expected. And then more.

Rhodey skipped a lot of it, obviously familiar enough that he knew what happened when. Between the few minutes at a time that they watched, Tony got more and more beat up, as punishment for the taunts and jabs he couldn’t seem to stop making. A split lip, bruised cheek, clothes that got rumpled, a bloody cut on his other cheek, hair messed up like it had been grabbed and yanked.

He was roughed up a good deal by the time they got to the important parts, and Rhodey stepped back at one point, turning away while they watched the footage.

It hurt, deeply, to see and hear the absolute certainty in Tony’s voice when he told the villain that the Avengers wouldn’t come for him. That they’d probably be happy if he were dead. That they didn’t care, and never had.

He believed it. It was so clear on his face. He was absolutely 100% convinced that they wouldn’t come for him, wouldn’t rescue him.

And he had been right. They hadn’t. They hadn’t even known he was gone.

Nobody was looking at each other when the footage finally ended with War Machine flying away, a deaged Tony holding onto him. Nobody dared. There was too much guilt and shame floating around the room, sinking into their stomachs, curling like thorns around their hearts.

Clint left first. He didn’t look at anyone, just turned around and walked straight out the door without a word.

Natasha left next, but she didn’t follow Clint. She headed off in the opposite direction, her arms folded across her chest and her head down.

Thor’s face was grave when he turned away, and he paused by Steve on his way to the door.

“It seems… we have a lot to apologize for,” He said lowly. “I had hoped never to feel this kind of shame for my own behavior again.”

Steve listened to him go, but didn’t look up. He stared at the floor of the lab, not seeing, Tony’s words ringing in his mind, bitter with the harsh truth.

_Didn’t you hear? The Avengers don’t exist anymore, and the ones that are still around wouldn’t care if I lived or died anyway._

Steve stood there for a long time, even after Rhodey left the lab, an impossible question circling over and over in his mind. 

If Tony had died… would he have really cared?


	14. Origami and Suits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha tells Thor about what happened while he was gone, Tony debuts his newest outfit, and Happy has something for him.

“Natasha?” Thor hovered in her doorway that evening, feeling uncharacteristically hesitant. She was sitting on the floor, folding origami flowers, and already had quite a pile next to her. She glanced up at Thor as she ran the edge of her nail over a fold, creasing it sharply.

“Hey. Come on in.”

Thor did, and settled himself somewhat stiffly on the dainty, beautifully carved wooden chair at her desk. He watched her work for a minute, slowly turning the flat piece of pale pink paper into a five-petaled flower.

“What’s on your mind?” Natasha asked as she added the flower to the pile and retrieved a fresh sheet of thin origami paper, this one a shade or two darker than the one before.

“I believe… it is time for me to understand what happened while I was gone. I have been disregarding it as an unimportant quarrel, but I’m beginning to understand it was more than that.”

“Yeah. It was a lot more than that.”

“It broke you. All of you. It broke our team.”

“Yeah,” Natasha sighed, her hands stilling briefly as she closed her eyes. “It did.”

“Tell me. Please. I need to know before I blunder any further.”

She made succinct work of it as she continued to fold flowers. She didn’t embellish the events with emotions or personal details, just listed the facts as they happened. It was an almost robotic recitation, but Thor could clearly sense the emotional turmoil underneath that the woman was usually so capable of keeping hidden.

“I’m not entirely clear about what happened in Siberia, after Zemo ran the video. Steve hasn’t said much. But I know he and Barnes fought against Tony, and it wasn’t pretty. They all walked away with injuries—or, well… Steve and Barnes walked away. From what I’ve been able to find out, Tony’s suit was damaged beyond repair, and he had to wait for a quinjet to pick him up. I don’t know the details, but it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that he’s lucky to have survived.”

Thor noted that Natasha’s hands shook just slightly as she added another folded flower to the stack, this one white. “Does Tony hold Barnes responsible?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t stick around long enough to check.” For the first time, a hint of emotion came out in her words, and Thor leaned forward to put his hand on her shoulder. She put her hand over his, giving it a gentle squeeze.

“Thank you for telling me. I wish I had been there. Perhaps I could have found a way to stop it. Or…” Thor sighed and bowed his head. “Perhaps I would have made it worse.”

“No way to know.” Natasha gathered the origami flowers in her hands and stood up. Thor watched as she went across to her bed and set them on it, then knelt down and pulled a large, flat box out from under the bed. She removed the lid, and Thor could see that it was filled with what had to be hundreds of identical origami flowers, all in shades of white and light pink. Natasha added the flowers she had just made, then put the box away.

“What are they for?” Thor asked, unsure if she would answer.

She just shook her head. “Nothing. Just something I do when my hands need a purpose and my mind needs a distraction.”

“They’re beautiful.”

“That’s why I chose them. They're Sakura. Cherry blossoms. I don't know what to do with them, I just know it's better to make them than to do anything else when I feel like this.”

Suspecting that he’d been allowed to see something of the Black Widow that perhaps no one else ever had, Thor got to his feet and impulsively gave her a gentle hug.

“Good night, Natasha. Thank you for speaking with me.”

“Good night.”

* * *

Pepper woke up before Tony the next morning, but instead of waking him up or getting out of bed, she stayed where she was and just watched him. He had fallen asleep curled up in a ball against her chest the night before, but during the night had shifted away and was lying on his back now. His arms and legs were sprawled out like a starfish, and his mouth was slightly open. 

He was just starting to wake up, twitching and shifting every so often. She could see his little foot moving under the blanket, rubbing his toes against the soft sheets, and one hand made its way into his sleep-rumpled hair so one finger could twist loosely into a lock of it. His eyes were moving under his eyelids, his dark eyelashes flickering slightly, and his breathing pattern changed.

As soon as his eyes blinked open a few minutes later, still heavy with sleep, Tony’s whole face lit with joy. 

“Hi Peppoh,” he said sweetly, rubbing at his eyes with his fist as he smiled at her. “I love you.”

Pepper pulled the little boy into her arms and hugged him as tight as she dared, all but melting inside. “Good morning, sweetheart. I love you too. And I love your smile, did you know that? I’ve always loved your smile.”

Giggling sleepily, Tony cuddled even closer, burying his face in her neck. It was actually a very familiar thing, Tony often woke up in the mornings and immediately hid his face in Pepper’s neck, his facial hair tickling at her skin while he briefly hid from the day. A sudden shaft of something like homesickness went through her, and she realized once again how very much she missed her Tony, adult Tony. The one she was in love with.

“Are you sad, Peppoh?” Tony had obviously picked up on her mood, and she wondered if she had sighed.

“No, sweetie, I’m not. I just miss your hugs when you’re big.” She gave him a gentle squeeze. “I still love these hugs, though. You always give good hugs.”

He squeezed back, obviously putting a great deal of effort into it if his slight grunt was to be believed, and panted slightly when he was done. “There. All better.”

Smiling into his messy curls, Pepper nodded. “You’re right. All better.”

They laid there together for another minute, Tony lying limp and warm on top of her while he continued to wake up, then he whispered in a hopeful way, “Coffee?”

Pepper couldn’t help but laugh.

Before breakfast, Tony picked out his outfit, and went with the tiny custom-made suit that matched Happy. He looked very pleased with himself as he admired the outfit, and though his small fingers had fumbled with it clumsily, he even managed to tie his miniature black tie all by himself.

“I’m ready!” He announced cheerfully, holding his arms out for inspection.

“You look very dapper!” Pepper told him, holding out her hand. “I love it. Let’s go find Happy, he’ll get all flustered and red.”

Tony giggled, almost demonically, and tugged her along with him as he went running from the room, ready to tackle the day with all the exuberance of youth.

Happy was waiting for them in the kitchen, already making hashbrowns and oatmeal and sausage, and Tony immediately dragged a footstool over so he could watch.

“Hey, little boss. How does—are you wearing a suit?”

Tony beamed as he looked up at Happy, then tugged on the sleeve of his suit. “We match.” He whispered conspiratorially, and Pepper grinned as Happy started to blush.

“You… you got a suit just to match me?”

Tony nodded, his loose curls bouncing as his eyes twinkled with mischief. “And I did my tie all by myself!” He held up the end of it, and showed off the knot, and Happy was so busy trying to hide his delight that Pepper had to save the hashbrowns from burning.

Once they were all sitting around the table (Tony clutching and sipping cream-and-sugar coffee from his little espresso cup), Happy leaned over and pulled a brightly wrapped package off the empty chair next to him.

“I gotcha something,” He said, sliding it over to Tony, and Tony nearly spilled his coffee in his rush to set it down and grab at the package. He tore open the wrapping paper, asking what it was over and over, then his mouth dropped open and his eyes went wide when he saw it.

It was a plushie robot, big and blocky and soft with a square smile and big googly eyes. It had long ridged arms and legs and a heart-shaped button you could press to make lights blink in its chest and antenna. Tony stared at it for a few seconds, absolutely speechless, then he squealed and all but fell out of his chair lunging for Happy.

“I LOVE IT!” He shrieked, trying to hug Happy without letting go of the robot that was at least half as tall as he was. “I LOVE MY ROBOT!”

Happy was turning pink as he picked Tony up and returned his hug, and Pepper was quick to grab her phone and snap a few pictures of it. With their matching suits it was irresistible.

They barely got Tony calmed down enough to finish his breakfast (and he managed to scoop at least two extra spoonfuls of brown sugar into his oatmeal while he argued with Pepper about having more coffee), but at last they were done and cleaned up and headed for the lab. It was Rhodey’s idea, having Tony look over what they had on the machine to see if he could help. He remembered people and life events, and spent ten minutes arguing with Rhodey about whether or not it made sense that parsecs in Star Wars were measures of distance and not time (a very old and well-worn argument), so odds were that he still retained all his vast knowledge and genius intellect. They could certainly use it.


	15. A Sign of Weakness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ex-Avengers and Tony manage to coexist in a room without all hell breaking loose. Until Tony realizes who is missing.

It had been Clint’s idea. After the… utter _disaster_ it had been every time they’d been around Tony so far, Natasha, Steve, and Clint desperately wanted to help somehow. Unfortunately, it wasn’t like they could volunteer to babysit, and if Jane Foster, Stephen Strange, and Thor had no idea how to figure out or fix the machine, it wasn’t like they were going to be at all helpful. But Clint offered anyway, and Natasha suspected it was because Rhodey figured it couldn’t hurt that he accepted the offer.

They were in the lab, still parsing out most of what they’d already been told. Clint was talking to Rhodey and watching some enhanced video footage of the seconds before and after the explosion in the warehouse again and again. Steve was talking to Jane, sorting through the finer points of the simplified scientific explanations the scientist had given him, and Natasha was getting a crash-course in Asgardian magic from Thor. They were finally getting to the point that they might actually understand it all, when a quiet curse from Rhodey brought their heads around.

They all watched as he exited the lab, and through the glass walls they saw Pepper and Tony coming down the hall. Rhodey caught up to them, giving Tony a high five before talking with Pepper. They could hear him through he’d left the door open, and kept quiet as he spoke.

“I’m sorry, Pep, I completely forgot. They offered to help, and I figured a few more pairs of eyes couldn’t hurt. Maybe they’ll see something we don’t.”

Pepper was nodding, and while she didn’t exactly look happy, she didn’t look upset either. “It’s okay, we can come back. Tony, is that okay with you? Do you want to come back later?”

Natasha was moving before she thought about it, going to the open lab door. “Rhodey?” She kept her voice quiet, but she suspected it was because Tony had seen her coming that he didn’t startle, though he did press closer to Pepper’s leg. Pepper and Rhodey both looked at her.

“We can leave. It’s no problem. We'll come back another time.” She looked over her shoulder to see Clint, Steve, and Thor already coming her way, sending quick nervous glances at Tony. Steve was even slumping his shoulders in, as if he were trying to appear smaller. In any other situation, it would have been cute.

Pepper had crouched down by Tony and put her arm around him, smiling encouragingly. “It’s okay, we’ll just take turns with the lab today. They had a turn already, now it’s your turn for awhile.”

Tony’s hand that wasn’t clutching a stuffed robot was pulling and kneading at the end of the tiny necktie he was wearing, and he leaned a little bit closer to Pepper. 

“They can stay,” Tony whispered in her ear, sending a brief apprehensive glance at the four of them before looking away again. “If they don’t hurt me again.”

Natasha could see the flash of heartbreak in Pepper’s eyes as she scooped Tony up in her arms and stood. “Of course they won’t hurt you. _Nobody_ is gonna hurt you, sweetie, I promise. I can even have Happy come sit with you too, if you want?”

Tony shook his head slowly, but Natasha saw the way his fingers were nearly white, clenched on the stuffed robot in his hands. “It’s okay.”

Rhodey looked around at all of them, his gaze lingering on Tony for a few extra seconds. “Okay. If it’s alright with Tony, we’ll figure it out. You four,” He glanced back at Natasha, Thor, Clint, and Steve, “can go ahead and go back to what you were doing. And you, you crazy robot boy,” he ruffled Tony’s hair, earning a smile. “We’ll get you set up on the couch with a tablet and some holoscreens so you can put that big brain of yours to work.”

Tony nodded, reaching for Rhodey’s hand just to hold on to it, and it was like a snapshot that burned itself into Natasha’s mind. Tony in Pepper’s arms, holding Rhodey’s hand, a stuffed robot smooshed in next to him. 

Natasha couldn’t think of the last time that she, or any of the other Avengers, had actually been allowed to touch Tony. It had to have been before Siberia, but when was the very last time? Tony had always been free with casual affection and touch. Shoulder squeezes, cheek kisses, and pats on the back had become commonplace. To be honest, it was probably due to Tony and his easy camaraderie that the Avengers had become friendly so fast. And it wasn’t until this moment that Natasha realized how strange and uncomfortable it had been that Tony hadn’t been within arm’s reach of any of them, even before he was deaged. It was a barrier that he’d never put up between them before, trusting them with his incredibly human body, despite multiple instances in which they had proved that they didn’t deserve that trust.

She had questioned a lot of her own decisions in her life, she was used to that. But the one that she found herself questioning more with every day that passed was the decision to let Steve and Barnes go that day. Followed closely by the decision to leave the Compound and join them in Wakanda.

Her own words seemed to mock her, words she’d said in the communal area upstairs after that horrible man, Ross, had proposed the Accords.

_Staying together is more important than how we stay together._

Maybe she should have tried a little harder to follow her own advice.

She and the other three were apprehensive about being in the same room with Tony again. She could feel Steve, Clint, and Thor’s nervous energy as they tried not to shuffle their feet, the three of them back where they’d been before.

Tony’s eyes were wide as he looked at them, and it was all too easy to read the fear and reluctance in them as he came into the room with Pepper. He clung to her and to his stuffed robot, but he didn’t seem able to stop looking at the others. Natasha wondered if it was because he was afraid that if he took his eyes off them, they’d try to come closer.

With deliberate movements, Natasha sat back down at the lab table she had been at before, scooting in and folding her arms on the top of it. After a moment, Steve, Clint, and Thor did the same, sitting next to her, and none of them budged while Pepper got Tony situated on the couch in the corner, the one that Bruce and Tony had often been found lounging or napping on when they worked in the lab.

“Okay, shall we continue?” Rhodey asked. He didn’t wait for an answer, just waved for the others to carry on, then went to sit on Tony’s other side. Natasha kept glancing over as Thor returned to his explanation of Asgardian magic, watching as Pepper idly toyed with Tony’s loose curls, and Rhodey leaned in close to show him what was on the tablet.

It was somewhat difficult, paying attention to what Thor was saying and also trying to hear Tony. The kid was speaking too quietly, though, but he seemed to be contributing.

“That’s good, Tony, that’s perfect,” Rhodey was murmuring, typing notes on his phone. “Anything else?”

Tony was still too quiet to hear, nearly whispering, but Rhodey was nodding and typing as fast as he could. Clearly that genius mind was at work.

“…Natasha?”

She blinked and had to suppress a slight flinch as she looked back at Thor. “Sorry. Keep going.”

It was lunchtime before Thor had finished what he called the “short version” of the history of Asgardian magic, and Natasha’s head was swimming with the information. There was… a whole lotta stuff that she didn’t have a hope of understanding, but hopefully she had retained enough that she’d be helpful at some point.

She had almost forgotten that Tony was in there, when suddenly he spoke up, the first time she’d heard him say something out loud since he’d come into the lab.

“Bwuce.”

Everyone’s eyes turned towards Tony, but he was staring down at the tablet in his hands. Natasha couldn’t quite see from the angle she was at, but it looked like some kind of photograph on the screen.

“What, honey?” Pepper asked, going over and ruffling his hair.

Tony looked up with those big eyes full of confusion and asked, “Where’s my Bwucie-bear?”

He tilted the tablet just enough that Natasha could see what was on the screen, and something in her shuddered and went cold when she saw that it was a picture of them. The original six Avengers, all smiling at the camera with their arms around each other.

Steve leaned towards Natasha, murmuring quietly. “His bear?”

She shook her head minutely, carefully keeping her expression blank and her voice unaffected as she answered. “Banner.”

“Ohhhh.” Steve’s eyebrows contracted, and she could practically smell the worry on him. “Oh no…”

Pepper was looking as apprehensive and worried as Steve. “Tony, Bruce is… he’s gone, sweetie, remember?”

Those big brown eyes suddenly filled with tears. “Gone? Like Mama and my Jarvises?”

A stricken silence filled the room before Pepper gasped shakily and pulled the little boy into her arms. “Oh, honey no. He’s not dead. He’s not. We just don’t know where he is. He left in a quinjet, remember? After Sokovia? And we can’t find him.”

As they all watched, it became apparent that Tony was struggling not to cry, and losing the fight. He kept sniffling, and tears kept spilling down his cheeks, no matter how many he wiped off on the sleeve of the little black suit he was wearing. It was heartbreaking, and though Natasha had no idea _what_ to do, she still ached to do _something_.

Pepper was cuddling Tony close and murmuring in his ear, trying to comfort him. “It’s alright, honey. It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry,” The little boy mumbled, scrubbing at his eyes again, his voice shaking. “’m trying to be brave. Not supposed to cry. People don’t like crybabies, it’s a sign of weakness.” 

He said the last bit a little differently, as though he were quoting something he’d heard often. He sniffled miserably, shuddering a little as he tried to stop crying, burying his face in his stuffed robot.

Something about what he said, the way he phrased it, the way he struggled to get himself under control… it broke open a memory that Natasha always kept buried, with others from that nightmare space of her life before Clint had found her. Memories from the Red Room.

They hadn’t been allowed to cry. It was a sign of utmost weakness, that they couldn’t control their emotions. That kind of thing had been punished. Natasha could remember it, the way it ached in her throat to try and swallow the tears, to blink hard to keep them from showing, distracting herself by doing multiplication tables in her head as high up as she could go. To watch the other girls trying to stop the tears, to make their feelings go away before one of the instructors noticed, because being punished was so much worse than not crying.

Tony… he was doing the same thing.

Natasha couldn’t bear to be in the same room any longer.

As Pepper hugged Tony and told him that of course it was okay to cry, Natasha abruptly turned on her heel and left quickly, before the memories could swamp her. She could feel Clint’s eyes on her as she considered the horrifying fact that Tony Stark had been far more hurt and abused, both as a child and as an adult, than anyone ever could have guessed.


	16. Various Types of Friendships

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy and Tony have cheeseburgers and visit the bots, while Clint finds Natasha.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You are super lucky, because you get TWO MORE ARTS FROM [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)!!!

That evening, Happy and Tony sat side by side on the bench on Tony and Pepper’s patio, eating cheeseburgers as they watched the sun go down. Tony’s feet, clad in tiny black loafers that matched his black suit, swung back and forth a little as he ate a burger nearly the size of his head. 

[ ](http://imgbox.com/cPWusy1x)

His stuffed robot, which hadn’t been out of his sight all day, was sitting carefully propped up next to him. Happy had been compelled, once or twice, to clear his throat against a surge of emotion at the fuss Tony made about it.

It had been almost a week since the deaging, and Happy knew by now that bite-size Tony would usually be chattering, talking around mouthfuls of food about anything and everything. He liked talking to people, he always had, but in his kid-sized body he didn’t have the kind of self-restraint and filters that he did as an adult. It made Happy sad, actually, to realize how much of himself Tony had probably been repressing for years. It also made him wonder about the creation of Dum-E, U, JARVIS, and FRIDAY, if they’d been created as advancements in science or because Tony was so lonely and desperate to talk freely to _anyone_ that he had literally built himself some friends.

It broke Happy’s heart.

Lifting the hand that wasn’t holding his own cheeseburger, he ruffled Tony’s hair, smiling sadly when Tony leaned into him. It was disconcerting, the energetic little boy being so still and quiet.

“You like your burger?” Cheeseburgers had been Tony’s comfort food as long as Happy had known him, and he had probably been through every fast food drive-thru within a twenty mile radius of anywhere Tony had lived. Tony’s favorite places had his order memorized and knew both him and Happy by name, and not because Tony was famous. After a rough day, if Tony hadn’t already ordered cheeseburgers for himself, Happy knew it was a surefire way to make him feel at least a little bit better. And after what Pepper had told him about what had happened in the lab that afternoon, he figured the kid could use any kind of comfort Happy could give him.

Tony nodded, glancing up at Happy with a chipmunk-cheeked smile. “I love cheeseburgers.”

“I know you do. When you’re all done, you wanna go and show your robot to Dum-E and U? Pepper said you didn’t get a chance to earlier, since you were busy working.”

Tony brightened. “Yes! They’ll love my robot!”

“Okay, finish your burger, then we’ll go inside.”

They both kept eating, and Happy was just finishing up when Tony made a soft, distressed noise, still holding a third of his cheeseburger.

“What’s up, buddy?”

Tony looked up at him with sad eyes. “I don’t think I can finish it.”

With a smile, Happy gave his hair another ruffle, then tucked the wrapper back around the rest of the burger. “That’s okay, you’ve got a small tummy right now. You can save it for later if you want.”

Leaning a little more into Happy’s side, Tony sighed. “Thanks, Happy. You’re a good friend.”

Feeling all kinds of gooey inside, Happy picked up the takeout bag and scooped Tony up. “You’re a good friend too, kid. You always have been. Even when you’re getting ketchup and mustard all over my suit.”

Tony’s dismayed shriek at seeing the smeared blob of condiments that had dribbled on his pants, and then transferred to Happy’s suit jacket, was absolutely hilarious.

* * *

Clint always knew where to find her when she was like this. And he was dead certain that this situation would put her in exactly the kind of headspace that scared her the most.

He took a quick detour by her room, just in case, but then opened up the access panel in the ceiling of her closet and swung himself up into the vents.

Before everything had happened, and he and the rest of the Avengers had been branded criminals (which, he had finally been forced to admit, they had deserved), the system of vents and ducts had spread through the entire Compound. Only a few areas had been blocked off due to privacy or safety reasons, like other living quarters and medical. Now, though, there were only a few vents that he could access, shiny new titanium grates bolted and welded in place to block him away from the rest of the Compound. He could get around his and Nat’s living area, and one single vent that connected to the communal space, but that was it. Everything else had been blocked off.

Rather symbolic, wasn’t it?

He crawled his way to the junction that sat over his and Natasha’s rooms, and sure enough, there she was, sitting in the little nest he’d made for himself, curled in on herself. He didn’t try to silence his approach, but sometimes she was so deep in her head that she wasn’t aware of her surroundings anyway. It would be hard to tell until he saw her face.

Clint reached out once he was next to her, resting a hand on her shoulder carefully. “Nat?”

She didn’t move or give any sign that she’d heard him, but her eyes weren’t glassy and distant, so he knew she was listening anyway. He sat down next to her, close enough that they would touch if she leaned over, but not so close as to crowd her. “Red Room?”

Natasha shuddered almost imperceptibly when he said the words, and he knew he’d guessed right. “Can you tell me?”

He saw her jaw tighten a little, a muscle in her cheek twitch, and he waited. Finally, after several long minutes, she spoke. In short, clipped sentences that echoed a little through the metal maze they sat in.

“We weren’t allowed to cry. Or feel. Weakness.”

“They trained it out of you.”

“We learned to stop crying. To hold it inside.” She swallowed hard, and haunted green eyes met his. “Tony was doing that.”

Clint understood the implications of her words. “You think he was given a reason not to cry or be weak.”

She nodded once, jerkily, her red hair swaying around her face. “Maybe as a kid. Maybe more as an adult.” The breath she took shook slightly, and Clint shifted the slightest bit closer. “Kids shouldn’t… they shouldn’t…”

He knew Natasha had said as much as she was able, and he closed the distance between them. Cupping her cheek in his hand, he pressed his forehead to her temple and closed his eyes, wishing there were a way for him to take some of the pain and emotion she was struggling with.

Her hand, small and cold, reached for his, and she finally let herself sag a little, letting him take a little bit of her weight. Clint held her hand as he sat close to her, letting her take whatever strength from him that she could. It was all he could do for her in moments like this.

* * *

Tony dawdled a little as he and Happy walked to the lab, because he didn’t know if _they_ would still be there. He wanted to show his robot to Dum-E and U, but he didn’t want to see them again. They scared him so much, and he didn’t know how to make it stop. It felt like angry wasps inside his chest, like prickles on his skin, and like he was stuck underwater. He did not like it, and he didn’t want to feel that way again. He couldn't make it go away like he could when he was big.

He had even insisted on changing into shorts, and carefully wiping away the ketchup and mustard mess from his nice pants. Suits didn’t like messes, and they had to be taken care of. His Jarvis had taught him that, when he’d been little the first time.

The lab was dark when they finally rounded the last corner, and Tony sighed with relief as he let go of Happy’s hand to skip ahead. The doors opened for him automatically, the lights coming on, and FRIDAY must have told the bots that he was coming, because they lifted their arms and turned their cameras towards him, beeping.

“Hi!” He said excitedly, running across the room and holding up his toy robot. “Look what Happy gave me! He gave me a stuffed robot like you!”

The bots rolled out of their charging stations to meet him halfway, curiously looking at the bot and poking at it gently with their claws. Tony stood up on tiptoe so they could see it, demonstrating how the lights would blink when he pushed the heart-shaped button on the front.

[](http://imgbox.com/GI85PJBM)

Dum-E and U thought the trick was wonderful, pushing the button over and over to watch the lights come on. Tony let Dum-E hold his robot for a minute so U could push the button, and he rummaged through one of the cabinets against the wall until he found a notebook and pen. Writing very carefully (his writing was all wobbly now, because his hands were so small), he made himself a note to give U and Dum-E blinky lights when he was big again, because they would like that. He even got distracted for a minute, sketching out an idea to make their wheels light up with rainbow colors, before Happy reminded him that it was almost bedtime.

U had traded with Dum-E, and was holding his robot while Dum-E pressed the button. They beeped at Tony with happy noises, both of them petting at his hair with their claws once he got his robot back, and he climbed up on their bases so he could give both of his bots really big hugs. They were kinda clumsy and not very helpful sometimes, but Tony knew that it was just because they were sorta kids too, like he was now. He’d have to make sure to be extra nice to them when he got big. He’d forgotten how hard it was to be a kid.

“Bye, I love you!” He called over his shoulder when he left the lab with Happy a minute later, waving at the both of them while they bobbed their claws at him and beeped goodbye.

“I think they liked that, little boss.” Happy smiled down at him.

“They’re my best metal friends.” Tony said happily, snuggling his cheek against his robot and yawning. He suddenly felt really tired. If he were big, he would have probably had lots of coffee and stayed up really late, but Pepper wouldn’t let him. Maybe Happy would…

“I bet if we had just a _little_ bit of coffee, we could stay up and watch a movie.” He glanced up at Happy, not realizing that there was a very distinct mischievous sparkle in his eye, and a sly grin on his face.

Happy snorted, but he was smiling. “Not a chance, pal. This is the only time in my entire life that I’m ever gonna actually be able to get you to go to bed when you’re tired, and I’m not missing a single chance!”

Tony sighed. Oh well. It had been worth a try.


	17. Omelets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony has a rough night, but decides to make breakfast for Pepper in the morning.

It was a bit of a rough night, despite Tony seeming pretty sleepy by the time he went to bed. He’d had a long day, and he’d been exhausted from the stress earlier by the time the ex-Avengers had all left the lab around dinnertime. It was why Pepper had encouraged Happy’s cheeseburger idea, doing some SI work while Tony and his bodyguard/babysitter spent time together.

Tony was twitchy and restless as he tried to settle down and sleep, however. So Pepper let him fidget all he wanted, and tell her all about showing his robot stuffie to Dum-E and U, and read him an extra book (they had quite a stack on Tony’s nightstand now). When he finally seemed sleepy enough, well over an hour later, she ran her fingers through his hair and talked to him quietly, watching his eyelids get heavier and heavier. She didn’t stop playing with his hair when he was finally asleep. It was soothing for her too, the repetitive motion, his soft curls against her fingers. She hadn’t planned on going to sleep so early, she had her tablet and phone next to her so she could do some work, but watching Tony’s face while he slept peacefully lulled her right to sleep.

They both woke up several times, Tony whimpering with bad dreams and curling close into Pepper’s arms when she eased him awake. By the time dawn was approaching, Pepper might have been even more tired than she’d been before going to sleep. Tony slid out of bed, and she watched him head for the bathroom through heavy eyelids, but fell asleep again before he came back. She was so tired she didn’t hear it when, instead of coming back to bed, the little boy slipped out of the room.

* * *

“Boss, I really don’t think you should be doing that.” The AI sounded like she wasn’t sure if she was somewhat concerned or really quite worried.

“I can do it. I know how.” Tony held the skillet with both hands, his wrists trembling a little trying to hold it straight. “I maked this before.” 

He had been working very hard. His Pepper had been so tired, he had woken her up a lot last night when he couldn’t sleep. So he wanted to do something nice for her, something to make her smile because he loved her. 

“Omelets are difficult to master, even for people that are tall enough to reach the stove.”

Tony just scoffed and climbed up on the stool he had already gotten out. “I can reach.” Setting the pan down very carefully on the already lit burner, he grinned a little bit when the eggs didn’t spill at all. “See? I got it.”

FRIDAY wasn’t entirely convinced. “I think I’ll let Ms. Potts know what you’re up to.”

“Not yet!” Tony protested, watching the omelet very carefully. “It’s not ready yet.”

It also wasn’t ready a minute later, when Tony’s patience started to wane.

“It’s taking forever.”

“The temperature is rising as it should. Patience is a virtue.”

Tony turned up the heat, watching the flame lick along the edges of the pan. “Patience is boring.”

He was fascinated, watching the flame work. The way it was blue and green in the middle, then yellow and orange as it went further up. It wiggled and danced, like it was playing a game, and Tony was entranced by it. He didn't even hear FRIDAY talking to him.

At least… until an ear-splitting screeching sound yanked him right out of his daydreaming, and he realized that the kitchen was filling with smoke.

* * *

Pepper was in a full-scale panic as she flung herself out of bed and into the kitchen, eyes barely open even though her heart felt like it was pounding out of her chest.

“Tony?! Honey, where are you?!” Waking up to FRIDAY telling her there was an emergency in the kitchen, followed immediately by the sound of the fire alarm, had been the absolute worst thing she had ever felt in her life.

The fire suppressant system had already kicked in, vents in the ceiling sucking out the smoky air, and the sprinklers were out and on standby. They weren’t necessary, however, whatever fire there had been was out now.

And Tony was sitting next to the stove, a stepping stool next to him with a still-smoking pan wrapped in hot pads on top of it. He looked up at Pepper with a stricken expression on his face. He looked at the pan, the ruined… something inside it, then back at her.

“I tried to make this for you.” His eyes were filled with tears, making those big brown eyes even bigger and more heartbreaking. His bottom lip wobbled, and Pepper couldn’t stand it.

“Oh, sweetie, no! Don’t be sad!” She dropped down on the floor next to him and pulled him into her arms. “What were you trying to do?”

Tony rested his head on her chest. “An omelet. Like on the plane.”

Wasn’t that a bittersweet memory. “Maybe you shouldn’t try to do things with eggs anymore, honey. I don’t think they like you.”

He gave a shuddery little sigh, and Pepper rocked back and forth a few times, kissing his hair. “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay. You tried.”

“I just wanted to do something nice for you.” He huddled closer into her embrace, and she could feel the dampness of tears on her shirt.

“Oh, sweetie, you did a great job. Really!”

He sniffled, wiping at his eyes with the heel of his hand as he looked up at her. “I did?”

“You did! I can’t wait to try it.” She regretted the words even as they came out of her mouth, she knew this was just the worst idea ever, but… he was just so _sad!_

“It’s all black and yucky. It doesn’t look right.” Tony glanced over at the pan glumly. It had stopped smoking now, but that did not improve its appearance.

Taking a deep breath, Pepper resolutely reached up and got a fork out of the drawer. “You know what, I bet it tastes fine anyway.”

Tony’s eyes went wide. “You’re gonna _taste_ it?”

“You bet I am.”

“But…” He looked down at the pan and its sad contents. “It’s not cooked.”

“Honey, that omelet is so well done that crematoriums are sitting up and taking notes.” She poked around in the pan with her fork, trying to find a part of the omelet that wasn’t mostly blackened, and realized that he was right. While the bottom and very top of the omelet was indeed burned… the inside was still-runny raw egg.

_How_ had he managed that?

“You know what, I don’t even mind.” Scooping a bit onto the fork, Pepper forced herself to smile (though it certainly felt more like a grimace). Not giving herself a chance to go back on it, she shoved the bite in her mouth as Tony watched with wide eyes.

And then she promptly gagged.

Oh _wow_ , that was… that was even worse than she had expected. Cold and runny and crunchy and burnt and so salty it nearly made her eyes water. Oh _damn._

She was distracted from trying to decide what would be the least offensive way to spit it out, when suddenly Tony… kind of choked. Covering his mouth with his hands, he looked at Pepper almost guiltily, but then another sound escaped him. A sound… suspiciously like a giggle.

Narrowing her eyes, Pepper removed the egg tragedy from her mouth. “Excuse me, are you laughing at me?”

Tony shook his head, his curls ruffling on his forehead, but there was no hiding the way his eyes crinkled up at the corners and glittered with suppressed laughter.

Quickly swishing with a sip of coffee (oh no, he'd already made coffee, _how much had he had?!_ ), Pepper scooped Tony into her lap and started tickling him. “How dare you, you terrible thing! You are laughing at me for trying to taste your breakfast that you got all sad about!”

Tony squealed and shrieked with laughter, flailing around on her lap and trying to grab at her hands. “I didn’t mean to! No tickles!”

Giving him one good raspberry on his cheek, Pepper hugged the little boy and set him on his feet. “Tell you what, let’s put this in the sink to soak, and we’ll have Happy take us to get some French toast. We can eat in the car, we'll have a whole picnic on the floor."

Bouncing on his toes, Tony grinned and nodded ecstatically. “Yes! French toast and a car picnic!”

Standing up and holding out her hand, Pepper couldn’t suppress a laugh of her own as they headed for the garage, and spent the walk debating the finer points of maple syrup vs. blueberries and whipped cream.


	18. Rough History

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha makes up her mind to apologize to Tony, and braces herself for whatever his reaction may be.

Natasha brought it up with Pepper first. She didn’t want the woman to panic if Natasha tried to approach Tony, seeing as how she and the rest of them had done nothing but make things worse every time they were in the room with the kid. 

But she needed to talk to Tony. She needed to apologize. This was an entirely different kind of red in her ledger, and she would be damned if she let any more collect before at least trying to wipe this part out.

Pepper had been understandably reluctant, her eyes narrowed slightly while Natasha explained herself, but the protective mama bear instincts that had come out in full force with a child around backed off enough that they came to an agreement. As long as Natasha asked Tony if she could talk to him, respected his answer no matter what it was, and kept her distance, it would, hopefully, be fine.

She was tempted to lock herself in her room, hiding away from everyone. She could put on a mask, become a chameleon, and do just about anything, as long as she had that façade to hide behind. But this? Being utterly, baldly herself with no lies or camouflage to shield behind? It was utterly terrifying. And Natasha didn’t like to be afraid.

She waited until she didn’t feel like throwing up at the mere thought of it. It had been hard enough to learn to be herself around Clint, to let down her barriers and let him see _her_ , his endless patience allowing her to do it at her own pace. And then she’d had to do it all over again with Steve, who’d dragged her through it every step of the way, not letting up until she could at least admit to herself that, for the most part, she didn’t really know who she was anymore.

And Bruce, well, Bruce was another conundrum altogether, one she'd never been able to figure out before she'd lost her chance.

With Tony… they had never actually let down their walls around each other. In fact, Tony might even rival her with his ability to hide himself under layers and layers of masks and walls and distractions and impenetrable armor that he protected himself with. And Natasha could only say that about a small handful of people. The one time she had briefly glimpsed vulnerability in him had been the night of his birthday party when he’d been dying of palladium poisoning. She hadn’t realized then how rare it was, and once Tony had found out who she really was, he had never let her see that part of him again. There was always a wall up, usually a friendly one, but it was a wall nonetheless.

And she couldn’t blame him.

So this was going to be… really hard. Tony in his normal state would probably be able to handle this gracefully, be just sincere enough that no matter if he accepted Natasha’s apology or not, she’d feel better. But the Tony they were dealing with now, the one who simply didn’t have the kinds of complex emotions and protective mechanisms that he did as an adult, wouldn’t be able to make it easy on her. He would give her the full truth, say and show what he really thought and felt, and Natasha was afraid. She was afraid to know what Tony had been hiding so deeply within himself, what kind of truth had lurked under the surface all this time.

It was evening before she forced herself to walk to Tony and Pepper’s apartment at the back of the Compound, locking her body down so nobody would see the way she was trembling. She knocked at the door, and took a slow, deep breath as she waited to be accepted or sent away.

The door slid open after a minute, and she stepped inside cautiously. Pepper wasn’t anywhere she could see. But Tony was. He was sitting on the couch, dressed in brand new Hulk pajamas and holding a stuffed robot in his hands. He looked at her with huge, wary eyes, his body poised like he was prepared to run away.

“Peppoh will be right back.” He said, and Natasha could read all over his face and in his voice that he was trying to be brave, that he was warning her.

She had been avoiding this, being alone with him, since that first day, when the kid had scrambled away from Thor, clutching at his throat.

She didn’t want to know what nightmare version of herself lived in Tony’s head. She certainly had plenty of those to choose from.

“Tony, would it be okay if I talked to you? I’ll stay over here. I won’t come near you.”

He looked so anxious, his little face pinched with fear. “Why?”

“Because I want to apologize to you.”

She had surprised him with that, his wide eyes going even wider. “What for?”

“For not being a very good friend to you. That wasn’t nice of me, and I should have been better. I’m sorry.”

He blinked a few times, confusion filtering across his features, and then he lowered his head and there was silence between them. Natasha didn’t know what to do. Should she wait? Say something else? Just leave?

Tony was looking down at his stuffed robot, his little hands petting slowly along its long ridged arms and legs. Then Natasha saw the two tears that dripped down onto the plush surface.

Natasha didn’t often find herself aching to hold or be held by someone. She was far too self-contained for that, the need for physical touch something that had been trained out of her long ago. But she was approaching Tony before she could think, the urge to _soothe_ that sad little boy so powerful and sudden that she couldn’t stop herself.

Tony looked up, and jerked away from her when he saw her coming, his robot falling to the ground as both hands flew up to the sides of his neck. 

“Don’t poke me!” He yelped, nearly falling off the couch as he tried to get away.

Natasha froze so fast she nearly fell over, her momentum almost tripping her.

It took her a second to figure it out, to search through their certainly not-pristine history together to find the moment that Tony was remembering strongest right now, the one that made him afraid of her. 

It was an old one, just after the first betrayal (oh, how she hated that there had been more than one) had come to light. The lithium oxide injection she’d given him in that donut shop, clear back when he’d first found out that Natalie Rushman was no such thing.

Such a thing was nothing to her. She was a spy, an assassin, she’d done so much worse to people than inject them in the neck. She hadn’t thought twice about it then, knowing that if Tony had known it was coming, he would have stopped her. Trust issues.

Something inside her shriveled at the thought, the irony of how she’d dismissed those issues then. Would the past ever stop coming back to bite her in the ass?

Taking a step back, Natasha sighed shakily, brought herself under control, and folded her arms. “I won’t poke you. I won’t hurt you.”

Tony’s fear had him blurting out, “Everybody says that, but they all hurt me anyway. And they think it’s _funny_.” His eyes were glimmering with tears of obvious frustration. “Everyone hurts me and then they laugh at me, like I'm a _joke_.” His chest shook with a sob he couldn’t quite suppress. “It’s _not_ funny, and I hate it!” 

She couldn’t bear to try and pinpoint which exact instances he was thinking of now. She just… couldn’t stand it. “I’m sorry, Tony.” She murmured roughly, clenching her fingers into her arms, nails biting into her skin. “We all…” She couldn’t finish that, apologizing for the whole team. As if she were shifting blame off herself, onto the whole. It felt dishonest. "I'm sorry."

Those eyes, those big teary brown eyes that looked so huge in his small face, were still wary and suspicious, his mouth pulling down into a frown. Pepper came into the room just then, her hair damp from a shower, her eyes darting between Natasha and Tony as her brows pulled together.

“I don’t believe you,” Tony finally said, his voice shaking slightly as he looked Natasha right in the eye. “You always lie to me, and you always leave. I don’t believe you.”

She couldn’t think of a single moment she’d ever given him a reason to believe otherwise.


	19. The Worst Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve's attempt at mending fences ends disastrously.

The worst of it finally happened nine days after Tony had been deaged, and it was worse than Steve ever could have prepared for. He thought it was bad enough to see the fear and wariness in the little boy’s face anytime he or the other Avengers were in the room, the way he clammed up, his face closed off, and he seemed to get smaller in his skin when they were around. He’d been watching the day before, unseen down the hall across from the communal living room when Tony had been playing with Rhodey. They’d been building Legos, something that Tony was more than happy to do as an adult as well, and he and his best friend were in the midst of some kind of game that had devolved into Tony launching himself at Rhodey to be caught and tickled. He had been giggling fit to bust and squirming in Rhodey’s arms when Clint had come up into the communal space by the stairs.

Tony’s face, which had been shining with laughter and happiness seconds before, his eyes sparkling over a huge grin, changed so fast it was like he’d put on a mask. The smile disappeared, all traces of laughter were gone, and instead of sparkling with happiness, his eyes were cold and wary as they watched Clint rummage in the fridge for some leftover pizza.

Rhodey still held the little boy in his arms, and he adjusted his hold so that Tony could sit in his lap comfortably and still see Clint. Tony leaned into him, resting his head on Rhodey’s shoulder, suddenly looking somehow tired, as well as nervous and alert. 

Steve’s heart had broken as he watched, seeing the way all that exuberant, incandescent joy had disappeared as soon as one of the Avengers came into the room. It took all the life out of the little boy, and it hurt to see it happen. He wondered how many times it had happened before, before the deaging. How many times had the so-called Avengers managed to ruin Tony’s happiness simply by being there? How many times had his smile, his _sparkle_ , disappeared without any of them ever noticing?

So Steve determined, right then and there, that he was going to fix it. He was going to start to repair this shattered relationship that he hadn’t even realized had been so broken, and do everything he possibly could to earn back the trust that he’d been far too willing to break.

The next day presented the opportunity he was looking for, when he’d asked FRIDAY where Tony was, and learned that he was in the large kitchen and break room area for SI staff and other people that worked at the Compound. Tony was just finishing his lunch and waiting for Pepper to take him to the playground by the SI daycare center. It was perfect, a neutral area with people close in the SI offices by so Tony wouldn't feel trapped. Grabbing what he needed, Steve headed out and hoped that things would go well.

“Hey, Tony,” He hesitated just at the edge of the nearly empty break room space, waiting until the little boy looked up at him before getting a little bit closer. He saw the way his little body tensed, and his face paled as he set down the tablet that he’d been playing on. His feet, which had been dangling down from the chair he was sitting on at one of the tables, had stopped swinging. He held himself utterly still, those huge brown eyes watching Steve like a hawk.

“I was wondering, could I show you something? I think you might like it.” He asked gently. The idea had come to him last night when he’d been doing maintenance on his shield, adjusting the straps and buffing and polishing the shiny surface so it would be ready next time he needed it. He’d seen the way kids looked at the shield, the way their eyes lit up with awe and excitement. Maybe that would be the way to make a breakthrough with Tony. Rhodey had mentioned once that Tony had loved Captain America as a kid, even dressed up like him for Halloween once, and Steve knew that Tony had personally taken care of any maintenance the shield needed after seeing action. So maybe it was a way for them to strike up a fragile sort of friendship while Tony was stuck in this state. He had the shield strapped to his back, ready to bring out for show and tell.

The little boy was still regarding Steve with something like apprehension and suspicion, so Steve just maintained his distance and smiled, trying to appear as friendly as possible. “You wanna see it? I’m pretty sure you’ll like it.”

He could see the way Tony hesitated, thinking it through, but finally after several excruciatingly long moments, he finally nodded slightly. Slipping down off his chair, he held back for a minute, watching Steve warily, then finally took a few steps forward.

Steve smiled with relief, “I thought you might like to see this.” He took the shield out from behind his back, holding it in two hands to show him.

To Tony’s eyes, the flash of the overhead light on the curved, painted surface of the shield was like a boogeyman springing out of a closet in the dark, clawed hands up as it screamed in nightmares.

Eyes widening in horror, utter terror rose up in Tony’s body so fast it choked him, and he fell backwards with the force of it. Trying to scramble to his feet, he saw Steve lean forward, taking a step, coming towards him with the shield in his hands, and a scream of fear ripped out of his throat. Crossing his arms over his chest, he turned blindly and ran, bumping into things, his limbs moving jerkily from the fear, and when he tripped and fell he didn’t try to get up again. He just curled himself up as small as he could, his forehead pressed against something soft and scratchy, his hands digging into his shoulders as he held his shaking arms over his chest. And he waited for the rough hand on his shoulder, forcing him over on his back, and the blow to come.

* * *

Pepper had heard the scream in her office, just as she'd ended a call, and her heart leapt into her throat when she realized it was Tony. She had been running between her office and being with Tony all day long, trying to keep the business afloat during this banana-balls crazy time. Tony had been eating lunch, just finishing up, when her assistant had called her with a problem, so she’d made sure Tony had something to keep him entertained, under FRIDAY’s watchful eye, and run to her office just for a few minutes. 

She had no idea what could have happened that would make Tony scream like that. She nearly screeched to a stop when she got to the break room, shocked to see Steve standing in the space between the kitchen and break room filled with comfortable couches and chairs, on the line where the tile ended and the carpet began. He was pale, holding his shield loosely in one hand, and staring at something on the floor by one of the couches.

“I… I don’t know what’s wrong.” He said numbly, staring at her. “I don’t know what happened.”

Feeling panicky and worried sick, Pepper got closer until she found what Steve had been looking at.

Tony was curled up in a ball on the floor, his back to the couch, his eyes squeezed shut as he whimpered over and over, “Please don’t hurt me, please don’t hurt me.”

It broke her heart right in half, and she realized what had happened.

“Oh, sweetheart. Tony, honey, it’s me,” Pepper said as she approached him, kneeling down and smoothing his hair away from his face before pulling him into her lap. He was sobbing, tears streaming down his cheeks from his closed eyes, and he wouldn’t take his arms away from his chest.

“Please don’t hurt me,” He kept whispering, shaking like a leaf in her arms. “Please don’t hurt me.”

“What… what is it?” Steve asked, looking shaky himself. “Is it the arc reactor?”

Pepper had pressed her lips to Tony’s forehead, holding him tight against her chest. She rocked him slightly as she tried to calm him down, one hand slowly combing through his hair.

“Yes and no.” She finally answered, her voice sounding brittle to her own ears. “He gets like this sometimes when he has nightmares.”

“He gets… Tony has nightmares?”

Steve sounded far too surprised, and she desperately wanted to yell at him.

Instead, she nodded jerkily, resting her cheek on Tony’s head as she kept rocking and cuddling him close, feeling him tremble almost violently as he wept. “For years. Afghanistan, Obadiah, the wormhole, Killian, Ultron.” She paused, and her eyes flicked to Steve for just a second. “Siberia.”

Steve’s face fell as understanding seemed to dawn. “Zemo. And his parents.”

“No,” Pepper said, her face tight as she looked him right in the eye. “You. Slamming your shield down into his arc reactor. He wakes up screaming whenever he has nightmares about that.”

She watched the rest of the blood drain out of Steve’s face at her blunt words, and he looked at the little boy cowering in her lap with horror.

“I’m taking him home,” Pepper said abruptly as she struggled to her feet with Tony in her arms, ignoring the movement Steve made to come help. “Let Rhodey know when he gets here, please.”

Nodding dumbly, Steve stayed back as Pepper readjusted her hold on Tony, lifting him higher so he could rest his head on her shoulder as she carried him. His round cheeks were wet with tears, and he was breathing with little hiccuping gasps, his arms coming around her neck tightly so he could bury his face in her neck.

“It’s alright, honey,” Pepper whispered as she carried him out of the break room and towards their apartment, rubbing Tony’s back soothingly. “We’re okay. I’ve got you and nobody is going to hurt you, I promise. I promise.”

* * *

Steve’s brain had stalled out, unable to process what had just happened, and he stood alone in the break room for several long minutes after Pepper and Tony had disappeared. When it finally kicked in again, he fought a wild surge of nausea that threatened to send him lurching for the bathroom, before turning on his heel and heading to the gym.

By the time he finally dropped to his knees in exhaustion hours later, next to the pile of destroyed punching bags covered in bloody smears, he still hadn’t forgotten the way Tony had screamed when he’d seen Steve coming towards him with the shield. 

He didn’t sleep that night.


	20. A Breakthrough

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dr. Strange's Cloak behaves oddly, and a breakthrough comes from an unexpected source.
> 
> For my TSB fill R5 – Stephen Strange! Do you know what this means? ONLY ONE MORE SQUARE TIL BLACKOUT!
> 
> And even better.... TWO MORE SKETCHES BY [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)!!!
> 
> Full color art can be seen [on Tumblr](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) and in [Chapter 33](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60447559)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Through A Child's Eyes, It's Different - Chapter 20: A Breakthrough  
> Collaborator: rebelmeg  
> Card Number: 3055  
> Square Filled: R5 – Stephen Strange  
> Ship: Pepperony, Iron Squad, minor Jane/Thor  
> Rating: Teen  
> Major Tags: deaged Tony, science and magic  
> Summary: Dr. Strange's Cloak behaves oddly, and a breakthrough comes from an unexpected source.  
> Word Count: 35,704

To say that Stephen Strange was surprised when he entered Tony’s workshop the next afternoon, only to have the Cloak of Levitation immediately fly off his shoulders and race straight to Tony, was an understatement.

He couldn’t do anything but stare, watching as the fickle thing hovered over Tony, as if it were looking down at the kid. Tony was sitting on the floor with a notebook and pencil in his hands, leaning against Dum-E’s base as the bot chirped at him. The kid's went wide as he stared up at the Cloak, nervousness clear on his face. 

[ ](http://imgbox.com/bcz5Tyfo)

And then with a graceful whirl that made Tony startle, the Cloak repositioned itself and settled around the boy’s small shoulders, wrapping around him like a blanket. And then, after a moment of stillness, it nudged at Tony’s hand, indicating for him to continue.

A slow smile spread on Tony’s little face, delight taking over his features as he gently patted the folds of the Cloak. It seemed to snug just a bit closer around him, cuddling Tony within its depths, ruffling the loose curls on his head with the ends of the tall collar. Tony giggled, batting the interfering cloth away from his hair, then smiled to himself as he continued what he was doing in his notebook. Dum-E gave another beep, then clumsily patted at the Cloak with his claw, apparently giving his approval.

[ ](http://imgbox.com/1IxREQpS)

“Does it… normally do stuff like that? Your Cloak?” Jane Foster had watched the whole thing from her seat at one of the work tables, and she was looking between Stephen and the Cloak that had burritoed itself around Tony.

“No.” Stephen replied, realizing that this was the first time he’d had the Cloak with him at the Compound while they tried to figure out the deaging machine. “Can’t say that it does. Try to smother people, sure, but that… that’s a new one.”

Thor’s head popped up above the edge of the table next to Jane, from where he’d been lying down on the floor out of sight, dozing. “It seems your robe has a fondness for the little one.”

“Cloak,” Stephen corrected automatically, still staring at Tony, the bot, and the Cloak in bafflement. Tony was still diligently scribbling away, but every so often he would tip his head to the side, rubbing his cheek against the Cloak, a little curve of a smile on his face. “And yeah. Apparently it does.”

After another few moments of watching the (frankly adorable) interactions between artefact, bot, and child, Stephen refocused. There were parts of this disaster machine that they were still trying to figure out, where the technology and magic had been mashed up in such convoluted, confusing ways that even with the three of them, it was difficult to figure it all out. They still didn’t actually know what the machine was supposed to be _for_ , which was the bulk of the problem. It seemed to have something to do with time manipulation, maybe even time travel, but without understanding the hodgepodge of components, it was difficult to pinpoint its purpose.

Stifling his irritation, Stephen picked up another machine part and studied it, calling up magic with his other hand to take a closer look. At this rate, it could be months before they figured it out.

* * *

Pepper had been catching up with SI business after dinner, and Rhodey and Happy had been busy as well, so by the time she got down to the lab to take Tony to bed, the poor kid was already fast asleep on the couch.

Deciding she’d carry him to bed after she’d checked in with the little research group, she smoothed an errant curl out of Tony’s face (and gave the Cloak wrapped around him a quick pat) then joined Strange, Jane, and Thor at the computers.

“How’s it going?” She asked quietly, folding her arms as she looked at the screens. She didn’t understand most of it, but she could pick out the odd equation or scientific tidbit that she'd picked up over the past fifteen years of working with Tony.

Jane shrugged and sighed. “Slowly. We are maybe 90% sure it’s some kind of time manipulation device, but that’s a pretty broad range of applications. Was he trying to time travel? Control time? Reverse it, speed it up, do experiments, wreak havoc? It’s just impossible to tell until we know more.”

“Anything I can do?” Pepper asked.

“Unfortunately,” Strange said, “the one most likely to help us is the one asleep on the couch cuddling with a stuffed robot.”

“It’s true.” Jane shoved her hair back from her face, looking exhausted as Thor wrapped an arm around her. “I’ve read a few of his papers, Tony just has a grasp of unusual math concepts that I’ve never seen before. Maybe we can have him look over these calculations tomorrow, see if he can figure it out?”

“We can do that." Pepper nodded. "But for now, maybe you three should call it a night. It’s been a long day.”

Thor nodded. “Even I am feeling the effects of it. We can come back with fresh eyes in the morning.”

“He did it wrong.”

The little voice brought all their heads around, surprised to see Tony standing behind them, sleepy-eyed and tousle-haired, the Cloak still wrapped around his shoulders and trailing along behind him like a cape. He was looking up at the holoscreens, and pointed up at one of them, his notebook clutched in his other hand. “He did it wrong.”

“What?” Strange asked, trying to identify what he was talking about “Who did what wrong?”

“He wanted to live forever, but he did it wrong. Wasn’t supposed to make a grown-up a kid. Was supposed to make a grown-up stay grown up forever.”

“But he did it wrong,” Strange murmured to himself, the pieces starting to come together.

“Wait, Tony, do you mean he was trying to make himself immortal? The bad guy? To make himself live forever?” Jane’s voice was higher and faster than normal, her tiredness disappearing as she obviously started to catch on to what Tony was talking about.

Tony nodded again. “He did his math wrong. He thought he needed Steve's blood for the serum, to make him stronger, but he didn't. He just needed better math.” The little boy sighed, sounding adorably long-suffering as he held up his notebook, turned to a page that was covered with complex formulas and equations written in an unsteady, childish hand. "He just wasn't very smart."

Jane’s eyes flew between the notebook to the screen Tony had pointed to, where a complicated series of mathematical formulas were displayed. "Tony, can I—"

He was already holding out the notebook, yawning as he did so.

Jane read over the math in Tony's notebook, comparing it to the math on the screen several times, her mouth moving as she worked. As she did that, Strange was pulling up one sparking portal after another, bringing books and manuscripts out of rooms he summoned in midair.

“That’s it!” Jane yelled several minutes later, the same time Strange jabbed his finger at a line of ancient Sanskrit text and exclaimed, “Here it is!”

They started talking over each other, both of them explaining their parts of the problem at the same time, starting and finishing each other’s sentences, going at such a clip that Pepper didn’t even try to follow them.

“Hey, sweetheart.” She crouched down next to Tony, who looked torn between staying up continuing to help figure out the problem, and falling asleep on his feet. “You ready to go to bed?”

“I had a bad dream,” He whispered, leaning into the arm she wrapped around him. The Cloak briefly wiggled around as though it intended to get between the two of them in order to swathe itself more securely around Tony, but it stopped after a moment and settled for curling around his legs instead.

“I’m sorry, honey.” Pepper kissed his head, nuzzling into his dark curls. “You wanna lay back down on the couch? Or do you wanna go to our bed?”

“Peppoh, will you stay with me?” His big brown eyes looked up at her, hope shining in them despite an underlying sadness that still clung to him like a shadow. The corners of the Cloak’s collar were softly stroking at his cheeks, and while Pepper had no idea what to make of the enchanted outerwear, she knew a comforting gesture when she saw it.

She hugged him close. “Of course I will, precious. I’ll always stay with you. No matter where you are.”

* * *

Rhodey stopped to peek in Tony and Pepper’s room first when he got to the Compound very early the next morning, smiling at the way Tony was sprawled all over Pepper in the bed like an affectionate octopus. Strange’s Cloak was still there, too, Pepper had mentioned it when she’d texted him. It kind of perked up and twisted around when Rhodey came to the door, as if it were looking at him, and Rhodey waved. He didn’t know what the hell that Cloak actually was, but waving to an anthropomorphized Cloak wasn’t the weirdest thing he’d ever done. Honestly, considering the fact that his best friend had been deaged and Rhodey was working with a sorcerer, a demigod, and a space science badass to undo it… it wasn't even the weirdest thing he'd done this week.

He went to the lab next, hoping that the earlier breakthrough Pepper almost mentioned was good news. Thor was on the couch, snoring a little, and Strange and Jane looked desperately in need of some shut-eye too. They’d been working hard for the past week trying to figure out this machine, and now seemed even more determined to do so despite pulling an all-nighter.

Strange glanced up when Rhodey came in, and nodded. “My Cloak still with him?” There was a note of annoyance in Strange’s voice, though seemingly directed at the bizarre situation, rather than at Tony.

“It is, and it won’t budge. You know, I think… I think it’s trying to protect him, or comfort him, maybe?” Rhodey glanced at the sorcerer. “Has it ever done something like that before?”

Strange shrugged. “Not that I know of, but I’ve only been acquainted with it for a few years. It does tend to get… handsy, I suppose, when I’m having a particularly bad day.”

“Handsy?” Rhodey raised an eyebrow, his lips quirking in amusement.

“Or clingy. Clingy works. Doesn’t like to leave me alone.”

“So you’re saying that the magical artefact with incredible powers and mysticism likes to give you hugs when you’re sad?” Jane’s eyes were sparkling with suppressed laughter.

Strange sighed in a very put-upon way. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

Jane gave Rhodey a wink across the lab, the two of them grinning.

“You want me to go try and tell it to come back? Tony’s with Pepper, and they’re both sleeping, it’s not like he’s in any danger.”

“You can try, but it’s got a mind of its own.”

“Not the only supposedly not-human object around here that does.” Rhodey said as he went over to Jane for the science breakdown, patting U and Dum-E fondly as he passed them. “Okay, Dr. Foster. Dazzle me with your techno-babble.”


	21. Shenanigans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ex-Avengers head back to Wakanda, Darcy visits the Compound, and a difference in Tony is noticed.

Everyone knew it was for the best when the ex-Avengers were invited back to Wakanda for a visit. Princess Shuri had completed her work on Bucky Barnes while he was in cryo, and she thought it best for him to have a familiar face around when he woke up again.

Steve was clearly torn when he told Pepper about it, desperate to be there for Bucky, but also unwilling to leave while the situation with Tony was still unresolved. (The bitter part of her wondered why he felt bad about it now instead of before he’d completely destroyed any remaining friendship he and Tony might have had.)

Working hard to do the right thing, Pepper urged Steve to go. “He’ll want you there, won’t he? Barnes?”

“Yeah, I think so, but… I just feel wrong leaving.”

Pepper waited a moment, to make sure her reply was coming from the right place. “I know. But it’s not in your hands or mine anymore. And we’ll keep you updated if things change.”

Steve sighed deeply and nodded. “Okay. We’ll go as soon as we get transportation arranged.”

“You can take one of the quinjets.” Pepper offered. “They’re just sitting in the hangar.”

“Thank you. That would be great.”

“Make sure you get all the right paperwork figured out.”

Steve blinked a few times, confusion obvious. He’d never had to deal with the paperwork before. SHIELD always had, or Tony. Which meant Pepper. And while she was feeling magnanimous enough to let him and the other two use the quinjet to get to Wakanda, she hadn’t forgiven them enough to do their paperwork for them.

“Right. Paperwork. I’ll… get right on that.” He left the room, looking a little unsettled, and Pepper had to bite back a smirk.

“FRIDAY, send him a list of the paperwork he’ll need to get to Wakanda and back legally. They’ll never get there without at least some hand-holding.”

“Sure thing, Miss Potts. I presume that I won’t be filling anything out for them?”

“You presume correctly. I’m not above a little bit of pettiness from time to time, particularly when it comes to them.”

“Preach, girl boss.”

* * *

The next day, the ex-Avengers had been gone for a grand total of three hours, and Tony was high on life. It had taken him all of five minutes to give Happy the slip, and he was on a mission. The communal area was his first stop, and he was halfway to the kitchen before he realized that someone was sitting on the couch. 

He skidded to a stop, his shoes squeaking on the floor as he stared at the dark-haired young woman. “Who are you?”

She had looked up from her phone and was smiling at him, and seemed vaguely familiar. “Hey, squirt. I’m Darcy, I’m waiting for my friend Jane. It’s Girl Day Thursday.”

Tony got closer, curious and unafraid. “Jane is downstairs with Thor and Stephen.”

“Oh yeah?”

“They’re trying to fix a big broken machine.”

She nodded, snorting a little. “Yeah, that sounds like Jane 'Shenanigans' Foster. What’s your name, kid?”

“I’m Tony.” It was part reflex, part the manners that Pepper kept reminding him about, that had him holding out his hand to shake hers.

“OMG, you did not just do that, that is the cutest thing in the world.”

He tipped his head to the side, squinting at her slightly.

Grinning, Darcy shook his hand. “Nice to meet you, Tony. I’m Darcy.”

“Hi Darcy.”

“Hi Tony.”

An idea suddenly occurred to him, a logistics issue solved, and he smiled slyly. “Do you want a snack?”

“I always want a snack. What kind of snack did you have in mind?”

Tony pointed to the kitchen. “There are cookies on the top shelf. I can’t reach them by myself, but you can.”

Darcy nodded, looking impressed as she tucked her phone into her pocket. “That is a devious mind you’ve got there, squirt. I love it.”

* * *

An hour later, Pepper was in perhaps a quarter-state of panic when she finally checked the communal area, having been searching for Tony for the last twenty minutes. Happy was in a full state of panic, he’d been looking all over for the little boy, and had finally called in reinforcements. The woman sitting on one of the red couches with an earbud headphone in one ear was a surprise, but Pepper realized who she was immediately. 

“Miss Lewis! I’m so sorry, I forgot you were here, I apologize. FRIDAY told me when you got here, but Jane got distracted and I had a call come in right after that.”

Darcy smiled at her over the back of the couch. “That’s okay, I’m way too used to Jane getting distracted. The cutest kid in the world has been keeping me company.”

Pepper heard a distinctive giggle, and Tony popped up over the back of the couch as well, waving at her as the other of Darcy’s earbuds dangled from his ear.

“Tony! There you are!”

“Hi Peppoh! We listening to music!”

“FRIDAY, will you tell Happy that Tony’s in here.”

“I’m afraid my protocols won’t allow it, ma’am.”

“What? Why?”

“Because Mr. Stark said not to. They’re playing hide and seek.”

Pepper threw her hands up in frustration. “Tony!”

He had ducked down again, only his eyes and the top of his head visible.

Darcy was chuckling, “That figures, my first visit to the Avengers Compound and I fall in with a troublemaker.” She reached out to poke Tony in the ribs, and he swiped at her with a squeak.

“Thank you for keeping an eye on him, Miss Lewis. I can take you to the lab Jane is working in.”

“Cool, thanks. Can I have this back, squirt?” She wiggled her headphone cable.

Tony nodded and handed off the other earbud. “Thank you for playing with me, Darcy.”

“Gosh, you’re cute. Anytime.” 

As she stood, an empty cardboard box fell on the floor, and Tony sent Pepper a guilty look before disappearing behind the edge of the couch again. Darcy picked up the box, which Pepper recognized immediately.

“Anthony Edward Stark, where did you find those?”

A faint mumbling noise was all the answer she got.

Darcy looked between him and Pepper uncertainly. “Um, they were in the top cupboard in the kitchen, I got them out for him.”

Pepper sighed. “Of course. He squirreled boxes of them all over the Compound, we can only get them from this tiny bakery in Malibu and they’re his favorite. Tony, how many did you eat?”

His eyes peeked over the edge of the couch, accompanied by another mumble. Darcy was trying to bite back a smile.

“To be fair, I probably ate most of them. Dang good cookies.”

Tony nodded fervently.

Pepper had to fight the urge to sigh again. “Did they give you a tummy ache?”

He shook his head.

“Of course not. Come on, let’s show Miss Lewis to the lab, then we’ll find Happy. He’s worried about you.”

Looking delighted to have wiggled his way out of trouble, Tony grinned as he ran over to take her hand, beckoning to Darcy.

Pepper gave his hand a squeeze to get his attention, noticing that he had a dried milk mustache on his lip. “And then after, we’re going to have a serious talk about this. Especially hiding from Happy.”

He wilted, looking so dejected that Darcy made a noise of sympathy, and Pepper had to cover her mouth to hide her smile.

* * *

“You know, I’m starting to think that the only reason he’s been letting us babysit him up until now is for protection from them.” Happy didn’t have to explain who the _them_ was, as he, Pepper, and Rhodey stood in the doorway to Pepper and Tony’s room and watched the little boy sleep in the big bed. He had tuckered himself out that day with all his shenanigans, and he’d just about run Happy ragged trying to keep up with him. It was a relief that for the next twelve hours, Tony was in Pepper’s hands and sleeping through most of it. Adorable, impossible kid. 

Happy had seen glimpses of their Tony before, in the way those brown eyes twinkled, his mischievous grin, the way he played and teased. But today, the outright troublemaking and the way he’d gone all Bambi-eyed and innocent when he’d been trying to bargain with Pepper to have chocolate coffee crunch ice cream for dinner… This was the first day that Happy had really felt that their Tony was still in there somewhere. Not that he’d doubted it before, but this felt more right. A Tony that was boisterous and unafraid and scampering from one end of the Compound to the other, always talking and never holding still and teasing Happy when he couldn’t keep up. Happy had _missed him_.

Pepper nodded next to him, obviously having suspected the same thing Happy did about Tony’s behavior and the ex-Avengers departure. “I think you’re right.”

Rhodey shook his head and rubbed a hand down his face. “Just when I think things might start to get better, we get another curveball. I’ve known him for more than thirty years, but he still manages to surprise me on a regular basis. If it’s not impossibly huge strides in science, it’s epic displays of heroism and self-sacrifice, and if it’s not that, it’s hidden depths of suffering that he’s kept hidden from all of us.”

“And once you get past all that,” Pepper added, her voice shaking slightly, “why is it still a surprise to find out exactly how soft he is on the inside? He’s got the biggest heart out of everyone I know, but he keeps it so well-protected that it takes something extreme like him being deaged into a five-year-old for me to remember how deeply he loves, and how much he hurts.”

Happy and Rhodey both wrapped an arm around her, and the three of them stood in the doorway watching Tony sleep for a long time. And when he shifted in his sleep, then dramatically flopped over onto his stomach and mumbled in his sleep, "No, bad Dum-E, tha's _my_ wrench," all three of them dissolved into silent laughter.


	22. The Amazing Spider-Boy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter finds out about Tony's deaging, and Tony continues to be his incorrigible self.
> 
> This crosses off my Pepperony Bingo square I3 – Peter Parker

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you didn't get enough light-hearted silliness and tooth-rotting fluff in the last chapter... here's some more.
> 
> COMPLETE WITH ART BY [HEREANDNOWWEAREALIVE](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [SADEKUURO](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro)!!!! YOU GET A SKETCH! AND YOU GET A SKETCH! EVERYBODY GETS A SKETCH!

“Peter!” Pepper was more than a little stunned as she opened the door to hers and Tony’s suite the next afternoon to see Peter Parker standing there, looking awkward.

“Hi, Miss Potts. Um, I was just wondering, have you seen Tony? I checked in the lab, the workshop, and the garage, but he’s not there.”

She was about to ask him what he was doing here, why he was looking for Tony in the first place, but then she remembered… 

“Oh, right. It’s Friday.”

“Yeah.” Peter looked a little relieved that he didn’t have to explain himself. He got out of school early on Fridays, and since his Aunt May often worked a double shift, he had taken to coming out to the Compound every other Friday and spending the afternoon with Tony before heading home in the evening. They had several projects they’d been working on together, including updates for a new suit for the kid that had Iron Man armor tech. “So, is he here? Did he forget?”

This could go one of two ways. Pepper could lie, say that Tony was unavailable (not that he forgot, because that would break Peter’s heart), or she could tell him the bizarre truth. If it had been anyone else, she would have lied, no problem. But this was Peter, and he was different.

“I can show you where he is. But I should probably get you up to speed first.”

* * *

Peter’s jaw dropped when he went into Pepper and Tony’s guest room in their apartment. Tony was sitting on the floor amidst what had to be at least a thousand colorful plastic pieces of a K'Nex building set, and what certainly looked like a spaceship and launch pad was taking shape beside him. Searching through a pile of little stick pieces, Tony picked out a yellow one, and snapped it into place, his tongue poking out the corner of his mouth.

“Tony, look who’s here,” Pepper said, and he looked around in a distracted sort of way. 

Waving awkwardly, Peter stared at the little boy, stunned that he could actually see Tony in that small, round face. Those eyes especially, wow.

Tilting his head to the side, Tony looked slightly confused for a second, then his expression cleared and he grinned. “Peter!”

“Hi, Tony.” Peter waved again, and then nearly jumped out of his skin when Tony got to his feet and came barreling at him, throwing his arms around Peter’s legs and hugging tight.

“Um… what?”

Pepper was grinning. “I knew it.”

“Knew what?!” Peter felt on the brink of panicking.

“Tony still has his memories and emotions from before, just translated through the mind of a child. So this, right here? This is how Tony really feels about you, behind all the walls and self-restraint he puts up as an adult.”

Peter looked down at the head of tousled, dark brown curls. “He… likes me?”

“Kid, he _loves_ you. You’re one of his favorite people. Now hug him back, he loves hugs.”

Feeling a little bit like he had entered an episode of the Twilight Zone, Peter bent over and gingerly wrapped his arms around the boy.

Still grinning fit to burst, Tony pulled away slightly and looked up at him. “Peter, I’m playing building toys! Can you play too?”

Peter looked at the partially built spaceship, and the piles and piles of other pieces still scattered around. There was a whole world of potential in those pieces…

“Absolutely! Are you building a rocket?”

Looking like he might bounce around the room out of sheer happiness, Tony grabbed Peter’s hand and tugged him over, talking a mile a minute about what he was building. It took less than thirty seconds for the both of them to be sitting criss-cross on the floor, passing pieces back and forth as they added more to the rocket. Peter didn’t see, but Pepper snapped several pictures before leaving the room.

* * *

“This is definitely the best rocket ever.” Peter announced once he and Tony had finished, admiring the way they had figured out how to stabilize the rocket against the launch pad without having to connect it.

“It’s _awesome!_ ” Tony gushed, putting together a few pieces and giggling as he held up the vaguely humanoid shape “Look, an alien can fly it!”

They spent a good half hour with that, playing aliens and astronauts, and the part of Peter that was still clinging stubbornly to childhood even as the rest of him was chomping at the bit to be an adult _faster_ , was feeling all kinds of nostalgic and wistful. He couldn’t remember the last time he had really played like this, and he’d missed it.

Tony had pulled together a few of the little plastic rods and gears, red and blue ones, and he showed it to Peter. “Look! It’s you!”

Peter grinned and put together some red and yellow pieces. “And you! Iron Man!”

Tony was utterly delighted as Spiderman and Iron Man saved the astronauts from the aliens and then flew the rocket back to earth for pizza, which turned into a real-life search for snacks.

They were sitting at the counter in the kitchen (Tony up on his knees in his chair so he could reach everything) when suddenly an idea struck Peter. 

“Hey…” He said, around a mouthful of Twizzlers, “Tony… do you wanna try on the Spiderman suit?”

Tony’s eyes went huge, and his mouth, partially full of fruit-flavored marshmallows and chocolate chips, rounded into a little stunned O-shape. “Really?” 

“Heck yes! Come on, grab your snacks, let’s go to the lab. This will be good for research later! You can kinda feel what it’s like and help me make it better!”

Squealing excitedly, Tony jumped off his chair with snacks in hand, and the two of them raced off to the lab that was temporarily vacant since Strange, Jane, and Thor were taking the day off.

Peter kept his suit with him at all times, and he pulled it out of his backpack while Tony kicked off his shoes. He shimmied into the Spiderman suit eagerly, his whole face lit up with joy. The legs were far too long, bunching around his ankles while the toes went beyond his feet. The arms likewise bunched at the elbows and wrists, but Tony looked so pleased as he struck a heroic pose that Peter couldn’t help but applaud.

[](http://imgbox.com/vpxtgCaK)

“You look amazing! The Amazing Spider-Boy!”

Tony couldn’t seem to help the little excited wiggle he did, looking down at himself as he grinned. “It’s too big.”

[ ](http://imgbox.com/v4x8qfzr)

Peter was experiencing _I can’t even_ levels of cuteness overload as he snapped a couple pictures on his phone. “That’s okay, it looks great anyway. Hey! You should try the web shooters! To get the full experience.”

Peter did consider, very briefly, that perhaps he shouldn’t let a five-year-old loose in the lab with the web-shooters. But he shrugged it off. No way was he missing this.

* * *

When Rhodey came looking for the wayward boys half an hour later, he found them in the midst of what could almost be called wreckage. There was web fluid _everywhere_ , wall to wall, ceiling to floor, the webbing sticking chairs to tables and tools to the walls and Dum-E was bumping around the workshop making confused noises while Peter kept trying to scrape a glob of the stuff off the bot's camera. Tony was sitting on top of U, still wearing the Spiderman suit, with one arm slung around the strut and his other arm was pointed out like he was aiming again, his little fingers straining to reach the web shooter bracelet on his small wrist.

“Dare I ask what you two have been doing?” Rhodey crossed his arms, trying for a stern expression but knowing he failed epically when Tony just looked over and beamed, holding his arms out.

“Wo-dey, look! I’m Spider-Boy!”

“And he’s got good aim, too!” Peter added, grabbing a screwdriver to help pry the sticky, stubborn webbing from Dum-E’s claw.

“You call this mess good aim?” Rhodey questioned incredulously, motioning around the space.

“It’ll dissolve in a couple hours.” Peter shrugged. “No big deal.”

Unfortunately, Tony chose that moment to fire the web shooter again.

Rhodey couldn’t actually say anything, seeing as how his mouth, cheek, and half his neck had just been webbed, but he rather thought that it _was_ a big deal.

* * *

Pepper sighed with relief when she got home that evening, kicking off her shoes by the door and taking the pins out of her hair. She ran her fingers through it, untwisting the bun it had been trapped in all day.

“Thanks, Happy.” She said, smiling tiredly at him as she came into the living room to find him sitting on the couch. “How did it go?”

“I made dinner, and he was a backseat chef. He might have snuck something into the plate I set aside for you, every time I turned around he had something else in his hands.

Pepper laughed a little. “Yeah, that sounds like him. What’s he doing?”

Happy’s eyes crinkled up in a grin. “He discovered that he’s small enough that he can actually swim in the tub.”

Snorting a laugh, Pepper covered her face with a hand. It was her own fault. That enormous jetted tub was the one absurd and completely unnecessary luxury she had requested when Tony was designing their suite, and he had found the biggest one on the market. It was waist-deep and had a bench running around one side to sit on, and was eight feet across. Pepper could, and in fact had, filled it up and just floated on the surface of the water more than once. It was like having a mini swimming pool in her bathroom. “I presume FRIDAY’s keeping an eye on him?”

“Yes, ma’am.” The AI confirmed as Happy nodded.

“He kept splashing me.” Happy confessed after a brief pause, looking slightly embarrassed. 

Pepper laughed again and nodded. “I don’t blame you. I’ve got it now, go change. Enjoy your Tony-free evening.”

“Thanks. Tell Admiral Iron Man I said goodnight.”

Tony, who had a hat of bubbles on his head and what looked like an entire fleet of toy boats in the tub with him, beamed up at Pepper when she came in. “Peppoh! I swimmed!”

“Yeah, that’s what Happy told me. He also said you splashed him.” She raised an eyebrow at the boy.

Tony didn’t even blink, not the slightest bit contrite. “There was a storm. Storms splash.”

She had to stifle a laugh again as she started draining the tub, scooping water into her hands to wash the suds out of Tony’s hair. “Maybe next time the storms will be better behaved, so Happy doesn’t have to get all his suits dry cleaned.”

“I told him he could bill me.” Tony said, wiping water out of his eyes.

Pepper laughed so hard at that she nearly dropped the towel into the still-draining tub. “Tony! You are impossible!”

He just grinned at her cheekily. “But you love me anyway!”

“You’re right. I sure do. Now come on, bedtime.”

Half an hour later they were cozied up in bed, Tony’s hair still damp from the tub. He reached over to pick a book from the stack on his nightstand (he’d never had much of a chance to read children’s books when he was actually a kid, so he was apparently taking advantage of this time to catch up). He picked “Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel,” scooting his ever-present notebook out of the way.

“Let me see that,” Pepper said, holding her hand out for the notebook. It was the same one Tony had written all that math in, though those pages had been carefully torn out and posted up in the lab. He handed the notebook over and cuddled into her side as she flipped through it.

There were a few schematics, complete with scribbled instructions and extra diagrams. More pages of math that Pepper didn't have a hope of understanding. And a lot of drawings, which were adorably innocent and childish. Stick figures that were recognizable even with the unsteadily formed names under them. A lot of Pepper, Rhodey, Happy, and the bots, even some with Bruce, or Strange, Jane and Thor.

“What’s that?” Pepper asked, pointing to an odd, scribbly yellow circle in the top corner of one of the drawings of her and Tony. “Is that a sun?”

“That’s JARVIS!” Tony corrected, pointing at it. “Because he looks like sunshine, and he watches us all the time.”

Pepper felt a pang in her chest, suddenly really missing that AI, but she didn’t try to correct Tony. It wouldn’t bring anything but sadness if she reminded him JARVIS was gone. “I love it. I can see it now, that’s definitely JARVIS. And you’re right, he does look like sunshine.”

Tony flipped a few more pages, more drawings of himself with Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy, then pointed at a drawing with Dum-E, U, and a silvery blob. “That’s FRIDAY, but I didn’t do her very well.”

“I love it,” The AI chimed in, sounding pleased. “I look amazing.”

“She does,” Pepper agreed. “I forget that you’ve got an eye for art sometimes. Silly me.”

“I took art in school.” Tony said, turning more pages until he got to the blank ones near the middle. “So I could draw machines.”

“That’s right, I forgot that too. You still have the first drafting sketch of Dum-E, I’ve seen it.”

“It makes me feel proud.” Tony said around a yawn, snuggling in closer to her. “I did a good job.”

“You sure did. Now let’s read this story so we can go to sleep. You've got a big day of running Rhodey ragged tomorrow.”


	23. Concept of Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Half a world away, Bucky Barnes is faced with the decision to stay where he is, or take a chance on somewhere new.

The sun was coming up over the eastern edge of the world, and Bucky Barnes stood in the doorway of his Wakandan hut watching it. Golden glimmers of light danced on the lake, almost too bright to look at, but he watched it anyway. He’d been waiting an hour to see it.

In the grass on the other side of the hut, he could hear the goats waking up, and he knew the children from the nearby huts would be up and at it soon too. They’d probably be disappointed when they saw him already up, they took great pleasure in standing over him while he slept in his hut, startling him awake.

Along with the noises of the goats stirring and the occasional soft greetings in Xhosa that he could hear from the other huts, Bucky also heard a set of footsteps that didn’t fit into the Wakandan morning. It was a heavier tread, louder than the Wakandans walked. Bucky knew that stride, though. He’d listened to those footsteps nearly every day for half his life, even back when the person taking them had been all of ninety pounds soaking wet.

“Hey, Steve.” He murmured as soon as the guy came around the corner of the hut, glancing over at him. Steve smiled, looking glad to see him, but there was still that little line of tension between his eyebrows. It didn’t seem to matter what anyone did, that little crease in Steve’s forehead wouldn’t go away. Bucky had driven himself into half a nervous breakdown about it, convinced that the worry had been about him, before Natasha had been able to talk him down.

_"It's not you, Barnes. Not this time. Promise."_

She hadn't offered more information, and he hadn't asked.

He wasn’t 100% convinced that she was right, but 90% was still pretty damn good.

“Hey Buck. How’d you sleep?”

Bucky shrugged. “Some.” Sleep didn’t come easy or last long anymore, he was lucky to get four or five hours at a time during the nights. He was used to it. Shuri thought it might get better as time passed, and his body got used to being normal(ish) again. But he wasn’t too worried about it. Right now, the only thing he had to worry about was getting his mind and his body healthy again, and if that meant taking a three-hour nap in the shade of his hut in the middle of the afternoon, nobody was gonna say anything about it.

Right on cue with Steve’s arrival, one of the more stubborn goats came over and butted the guy hard in the back of the knee. Steve was used to it now, he’d already braced his weight on his other leg, so he just let his butted leg buckle and remained standing calmly. Satisfied, the goat (Bucky had named him Punk) wandered away again. Bucky watched him go with a smile, recalling the first few times the goat had communicated his displeasure with Steve and sent the supersoldier toppling to the ground.

“It’s not that funny.” Steve said with a tone of exasperation that Bucky just ignored.

They stood side by side and watched the sun rise a little higher, the sounds of the goats bleating and the Wakandans in the other huts getting breakfast surrounding them. It was peaceful, and on any other morning, Bucky would have enjoyed it. But he could practically smell the gears in Steve’s head working overtime, and he was just waiting for the bomb to drop. Sure enough, Steve took a quick breath, opened his mouth, stopped, and finally spoke.

“So… I was talking to Shuri and T’Challa yesterday.” He paused again, and Bucky could see him out of the corner of his eye, giving Bucky a slightly anxious glance.

“Mm.” He made a noncommittal noise, since Steve seemed to be waiting for a reply.

“Yeah. And… we talked about… maybe bringing you home.”

Bucky had kind of expected this, at least expected the subject to be broached, but it was still kind of a lot to hear it out loud. 

_Home_. What a complicated word that had become. Bucky couldn’t actually remember anymore what home felt like. He hadn’t had one for seventy-five years, not since he’d left Brooklyn in 1943, headed off to war with only the vaguest idea what that might be like. 

He’d had friends, the Howling Commandos had been like brothers, and having Steve there had been a little like having a piece of home with him. But they’d never stayed in one place, and Bucky had never gone back to Brooklyn. He definitely couldn’t call the bunker in Siberia home, no matter how many times he’d been frozen in that cryo chamber. He’d tried to find home when he’d been on the run, tried to find out what combination of objects and furniture made a place feel like home, with no success. And then Wakanda.

Bucky supposed that Wakanda had been the closest thing he’d had to home, in all those years. The closest he’d felt to _being_ home. He felt comfortable, anyway. And safe. He liked the people, he liked the heat, he liked the dumb goats. He liked the way the kids teased and played with him, and never looked at him with fear. He liked that Shuri and T’Challa were kind to him, treated him like a normal person, and that Queen Ramonda never looked at him with disdain, but instead smiled at him. He liked his hut with the ceiling that was too low, and the shelves that were wobbly, and the bed that creaked something awful.

That was something like home, wasn’t it?

Or maybe not.

“Don’t know that that’s a good idea, Steve. Won’t be walking into a warm welcome.” It was the excuse he was willing to give, the likelihood that Stark wouldn’t want him there. Far more preferable than telling Steve that he just didn’t want to go.

“It won’t be a problem. I promise. I’ve talked it over with Pepper, and she and Tony already knew about it from when I talked to you about it awhile back.”

Clearly Bucky’s hope that this problem would sort itself out if he ignored it long enough was fruitless. He recalled Steve mentioning it to him before, how Bucky could join the rest of them at the Compound, continue his therapy there. Bucky hadn’t said much about it, and figured that no matter what Steve said, there would be no way Stark would just let him live there. It was crazy, and that was coming from the brainwashed ex-assassin with a metal arm.

“It would be a good opportunity, Buck. Not just to get back in the States, but visit the old places, maybe to put more of your memory together. I know you’re still missing pieces.”

Sure, but that didn’t mean he wanted to go chasing after them. There was something to be said for patience, letting things come back to him instead of forcing it. 

“I dunno, Steve. I like it here.”

“I know.” Steve sighed as he looked out over the lake, the sun well up now to spread blazing light and baking heat. “And I get why.” He cast a sidelong glance at him that Bucky didn’t return. “I miss you, Buck. I just… kind of want a chance for us to be friends again.”

“We’ve always been friends, Steve.”

“But it’s different now. You’re…” _You’re different._

“I’m not gonna suddenly be who I was just because I’m in the States again, Steve. You know that, right?” Bucky looked him straight in the eye this time, needing the guy to understand.

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

A faint flush colored Steve’s cheeks, and he looked away. They were silent for a few minutes, each in their own thoughts. Bucky waited for Steve to speak first, and at last he did.

“I know you’re not the same anymore, Buck. And that you won’t be, maybe not ever.” There was sorrow in his voice, a kind of untouchable sadness that Bucky almost wished he could take away. “But I still want you to come back with us.”

Stubborn Steve. Never a fight he wouldn’t pick or a duty he wouldn’t lay down.

“I don’t know if I want to, Steve.” There. He’d said it. That had to count for something, right?

“I know. But… just think about it, okay? You’ve got a couple days to decide. We’re leaving Friday.”

Bucky nodded, his gaze having drifted to the ground in front of him. There was a path worn in it, one he’d created himself. It had all been grass and weeds before, cropped short by the goats all around the hut. But now there was proof that he'd been there, long enough to have habits and patterns. To carve out a life somewhere he'd never been before and hadn't been sure of the welcome he'd get. Proof that he was capable of such a thing.

“I’ll think about it.”

Steve’s shoulders loosened like he’d set down a heavy load, and after a brief hesitation, he put a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “Thanks. I won’t say anything else about it, promise. You just tell me what you decide.”

Bucky nodded. “I will.”

Punk had come back around the hut again, chewing on a mouthful of hay. Steve quickly got out of the goat’s way, sidestepping it carefully, then headed back up to the palace with a wave.

Bucky waved back and watched him go for a minute, before sliding down to sit with his back braced against the wall of his hut. Punk wandered over and flopped down in an ungainly way, his back resting against Bucky’s thigh.

Absentmindedly scratching at the rough hair between the goat’s horns, Bucky turned the conversation with Steve over his mind, idly watching the sunlight play off the thin gold lines in his new metal arm.

He could write down a pros and cons list, but he could already do that math in his head. And he could always use the excuse of his own mental health, which wasn’t an excuse at all, but in this case it kind of would be.

No. For this situation, he’d have to go with his gut. And unfortunately for himself, Bucky was pretty sure he knew what his gut would tell him.

He sighed as he closed his eyes, still seeing the sunshine red behind his eyelids. He took a deep breath in through his nose and listened hard, filling himself up with the smells and the sounds of the life he’d created for himself in this little hut at the lake’s edge. 

He didn’t want to leave it. Part of him wanted to stay in this safe, sheltered place until the last day of his life. There was peace to be had here, and that was something that Bucky considered valuable above all else, knowing just how rare and precious it was.

But there was the potential of a different kind of peace waiting for him half a world away. A peace he craved that he might earn through forgiveness. He didn’t know if he’d be able to find it, or if he’d even be considered worthy of receiving it. But he knew he had to take the chance. Much as he’d miss what he had here… Bucky knew he had to take the chance.


	24. Crossing the Pond

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky and the others head back home, and Pepper isn't sure how to explain it all to Tony.

“There’s, um… there’s something you should know.”

Bucky looked over at Steve flatly as the quinjet they were in started rising into the air, trying to quell the anxiety and suspicion that was rising up inside him. “What?”

“The thing is… Tony—Stark, he’s um… well, he’s—”

Natasha rolled her eyes and looked over her shoulder at them from where she was piloting the jet. “He was deaged. Almost a month ago.”

Bucky looked between her and Steve, then at Clint and Sam buckled into the flight seats across from them. “What?”

“Deaged. We don’t know how, there was something to do with a machine that some kind of psycho rigged up, but he ended up deaged. He’s… he’s still in there, his mind is still… intact. But he’s a kid.”

Bucky wasn’t sure if he wanted this to be a prank or not. “A kid.”

“Yeah.”

“Stark is a kid.”

“About five years old.”

“…huh.” Bucky glanced out the quinjet window, watching the clouds pass below them.

Steve fidgeted next to him, and Bucky could hear him open and shut his mouth a few times before he finally asked, “So do you have any questions?”

Bucky looked at him again, and was pretty sure that _“Can we turn around?”_ wasn’t one of the questions Steve meant.

“Not for now.” He said instead. “Maybe later though.”

“Okay.” Steve looked uneasy and uncomfortable, but once Natasha flipped on the autopilot and told them they’d reached cruising altitude, Bucky just unclipped his harness and headed for the tiny onboard bathroom as casually as he could manage. He stayed in there for awhile, long enough that he knew nobody would be fooled that he was in fact using the facilities, but he needed the privacy and they were smart enough to give it to him.

Natasha and Clint were sitting on the floor playing a game of cards when Bucky came out, while Steve still sat in the flight seat over Nat’s shoulder and looked at her cards. Bucky glanced around the small space, debating just going back in the bathroom, before he dragged his duffel back out of the overhead storage and rummaged around inside it until he found a book. It would at least give him a reason to sit by himself and not talk to anyone.

However, he hadn’t even gotten himself settled in the little nook between the flight seats and the bathroom before Sam was sidling over and sitting on the flight seat next to him.

“I know you’re Steve’s friend and he’s got your back.” The guy started, his voice quiet enough that the others wouldn’t hear over the sound of the engines. “But I also know he’s stubborn as a mule and he sometimes doesn’t think things through. So if you need me to set him straight about anything? Just let me know.”

Bucky stared up at him, taken aback. “Set him straight?”

“Like this leaving Wakanda thing. If you wanna go back, I’ll have them take you back. You don’t gotta come back with us just because Steve wants you to. You gotta do what’s best for you right now. And if that means more time to yourself in Wakanda, then we’ll make that happen.”

It was the first time any of these strangers and allies had acknowledged that Bucky was… his own person. Which felt strange, and kind of made him feel sick to realize it (was Hydra’s influence still lurking in his brain somewhere?). He was used to this kind of situation, going along with things to humor Steve, to make him happy. He’d done it as long as they’d known each other. But for Sam to come to Bucky now, and give him an out? Like humoring Steve had become something maybe not okay anymore?

Bucky really didn’t know how to feel about it.

“It’s fine.” He found himself saying. “For now, anyway.”

Sam didn’t look convinced, but he nodded. “A’ight. If that changes, you tell me, okay?”

Bucky looked at him, the seriousness and sincerity in his dark eyes, all over his face. “Okay. Thanks.”

Sam quirked a small smile at him. “No problem. And when we get back, don’t worry. You won’t be the only one dealing with a new situation. I haven’t been back either.”

That did make him feel a little better. “Good to know.”

“So if you end up going crazy and need someone to sit on you until it passes, just lemme know. I’ll come tie your ass down. I’ve done it before.”

Bucky surprised himself by laughing quietly, and he saw the glint of mischief in Sam’s eye as he grinned that gap-toothed smile.

Okay. Things would be alright. As long as that dumbass was around, maybe it would be alright.

* * *

“Happy, I don’t know what to tell him.”

Happy looked at Pepper across the island in hers and Tony’s kitchen, where they were sitting going over some SI paperwork. “Just tell him the truth.”

Pepper had her elbows braced on the countertop, and the heels of her hands pressing into her temples. “Yes, but what if he doesn’t understand? What if he doesn’t remember?”

“Of course he remembers, he had a panic attack when he saw Steve coming at him with the shield.” Happy signed and dated a monthly security report, sliding it across to her.

Pepper added it to a stack to her left. “But that’s different. He already knew Steve. And that memory has been a regular part of his nightmares for years now. But… Happy, I don’t think he remembers Barnes.”

Happy’s brows furrowed. “How could that be possible?”

Pepper just shook her head, not understanding it herself. “I don’t know. I tried to talk to Tony about it, I asked him if he remembered anything about Barnes. I even mentioned the metal arm, and he had that face like he kind of remembered, but I just don’t think it’ll come to him until he sees Barnes. Like it was with us.”

“Yeah.” Happy nodded, looking concerned. “We’ll just have to take it as it comes. He won’t be around when they get here tomorrow, I’ll make sure of that. Maybe I’ll take him out on the grounds, let him run around in the trees. Nobody will see us there.”

“That’s a good idea.” Pepper ran a hand through her hair and down her neck, squeezing at the tense muscles there. “Rhodey was already planning on being there, but maybe I should be too? Since Tony can’t be.”

“I think Rhodey can handle it himself, but if you need it, then go. You don’t have to ask permission or have a reason one way or the other. It’s your home. And if it's best for you and for Tony not to be around any of them at all? Then we'll deal with that. It's a big Compound, and FRIDAY can make sure they never cross paths.”

Pepper smiled at Happy, appreciating the way he knew what she was thinking even though she’d said anything but. “Thanks. You know, you’re one of my favorite people, Happy.”

He blushed, which was just adorable, and stammered a little bit before getting himself together. “I think we're done, so I'm gonna head out now. Get some shut-eye. Just let me know when you want me to come pick Tony up in the morning.”

“I will. Thanks Happy.” 

“No problem. Stop worrying.”

She nodded and tried to smile. “I’ll try.”


	25. Unexpected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky actually meets Tony for the first time.

When Bucky Barnes properly met Tony Stark for the first time, the day after he’d arrived at the Compound, it was completely unplanned and unexpected. Not to mention, Stark was a five-year-old, which actually did not make Bucky feel any better at the time.

The Compound was huge, and while Bucky was able to grasp and memorize the layouts of buildings with great skill, it helped if he had blueprints or a map to help. So far, all he’d seen of the Compound was the route from the helipad to his room, and from there to the communal area. That was it, and on this particular morning, when Steve had stopped by his room at shit o’clock in the morning to ask him if he wanted to go for a run ( _no_ , Steve, he did not want to go for a run at _five o’clock in the damned morning_ ), Bucky hadn’t been able to fall back asleep. He didn’t sleep much anyway.

He’d been rubbing his eyes as he walked, remembering something about a coffee machine in the communal area, and he must have gone right past the door he was supposed to take to the stairs. He didn’t realize it for at least a full minute, during which he had gone through the wrong door, taken the wrong stairs, and apparently gone down a completely different set of identical-looking stairs when he’d realized what he’d done. So that put him in the middle of the Avengers Compound, alone, with no idea where he was or how to get back to where he’d been. Great. Just the way to start his first official day on Tony Stark’s property. Fantastic.

He’d been wandering down a hall, peering through all the steel and glass that made up the building, hoping to run across a human being that could point him in the right direction, when a door in front of him opened. A little kid with dark hair and a stuffed robot in his hands made an appearance, rubbing his eyes with one hand and looking sleepy in his Star Wars pajamas. There was also a significant air of _sneaking_ about him, the way he was walking on his tiptoes and making sure the door shut behind him quietly.

If Steve hadn’t shown Bucky a video on the flight from Wakanda, he wouldn’t have even recognized Stark. He’d only met the guy a few times, and they’d nearly tried to kill each other all of those times. Not like he would have recognized the guy in kid form. But the footage Steve had shown to him and Sam had even included the stuffed robot, and Bucky froze in his tracks, panicking, not knowing what to do.

The kid noticed him a second later, looking (kind of adorably) confused for a few seconds before recognition seemed to flare up and he also froze in place, fear flashing over his features.

They stood there looking at each other for several painfully long moments, and Bucky could see the way the kid was clutching at his stuffed robot so hard his fingers were white.

“You’re Bucky?” He asked, his voice wavering slightly.

“Yeah.”

“I remember you.”

Bucky winced as he felt a pang of fear, and guilt. “I remember you too.”

The kid’s eyes were big and scared, but there was something determined and courageous in the way he squared his shoulders and asked, “You gonna hurt me?”

“No,” Bucky blurted out instantly, louder than he meant to, and it made Tony jump. “No, I’m not gonna hurt you.”

“Promise?” The poor kid, he was still obviously scared, but he was managing to power through it. Bucky felt oddly proud of him.

“I promise.”

Tony took a deep breath, then slowly walked forward. Bucky felt paralyzed as he watched him, kind of terrified of a kid that was barely three foot five and maybe forty pounds. Then he stuck his tiny hand out. “Okay. We can be friends.”

Bucky stared at that little hand, so stunned he felt like he’d topple over at a hint of a breeze. “Yeah?”

Tony nodded, but then uncertainty crossed his features and he started to take his hand back. “Only if you want to…”

Bucky nodded quickly, and slowly held out his hand. He took Tony’s hand with the lightest grip possible, and shook it gently. “Hi. I’m Bucky. Nice to meet you.”

There was a hint of a smile on that small face. “I’m Tony.” There was a beat of silence, the two of them staring at each other awkwardly, then, “You wanna play cars?”

A smile spread across Bucky’s face, and the flood of relief made him feel all kinds of wobbly. “Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that.”

* * *

“One day. It took _one day_ for him to go wandering off the reservation. Not even one day, it’s been less than eighteen hours.”

Sam Wilson was muttering to himself as he searched for Bucky, having woken up five minutes ago to find the guy’s room deserted. He had checked the communal area first, and then with Steve, being all casual about it just in case. But he wasn’t with Steve, he wasn’t in the communal area, and unless he was hiding under his own bed, Bucky wasn’t in his room. (He wasn't under his bed, Sam checked there and in the closet, just in case.)

So. Here he was. Conducting a search at six in the morning, without the foggiest idea where the dumbass might have gotten to. 

“Need to fix a bell to him,” Sam said under his breath, poking his head through another door as he passed it. “Maybe then we’ll hear him sneaking around.”

“Mr. Wilson?”

Sam nearly jumped out of his skin. He had forgotten about Stark’s AI, and he fell back against the wall with a hand on his chest.

“What the holy fu—”

“Language, please. There’s a child on the premises.” FRIDAY interrupted him, that Irish lilt packed with sass.

“Yeah, and the adult in his head swears too.” Sam couldn’t help but sass back, his heart rate finally coming back under control.

“Might I be of assistance? You seem to be looking for something.”

“Yeah, lookin’ for Barnes. I don’t suppose you’ve seen him lurking around?”

“Mr. Barnes is with Mr. Stark.”

This morning was just bad for Sam’s general health, it could not be good for his heart to stop twice in one minute. “What?”

“They happened upon each other earlier this morning. They’re in the daycare center on the first floor. I can direct you.”

Feeling at least… three and a half different kinds of anxious, Sam followed where FRIDAY directed him, and a few minutes later he was looking through a big window into a playroom with only two occupants. 

Bucky Barnes and a kid Tony Stark were sitting on the brightly carpeted floor, a box of toys upended next to them, and a pile of matchbox cars between them. They had cars in both hands, and it looked like Tony was making his fly through the air. Bucky was grinning at him, and Sam realized all of a sudden that that had to be the first real, unburdened, genuine smile he’d ever seen on the guy’s face.

"They're just… playing?" Sam asked, not sure if he believed his own eyes.

"I wouldn't allow Mr. Stark to remain in a dangerous situation, if that's what you're implying." FRIDAY practically snapped, and Sam wondered if it was possible to offend an AI.

"No offense meant, Skynet, keep your shamrocks on. Just wouldn't have ever guessed I'd find the ex-Winter Soldier and the son of Maria Stark playing with matchbox cars."

After watching for another minute, Sam opened the door to the playroom and smirked as he leaned against the doorjamb. “I shouldn’t be surprised. We’ve been here eighteen hours and you managed to disappear and kidnap a kid.”

Bucky looked up at him and rolled his eyes, but Tony had jumped in surprise when he’d spoken, so Sam quickly smiled at him.

“Hey there, small fry. I’m Sam. I don’t know if you remember me.”

Tony had his head cocked to the side, and he nodded. “I ‘member you. You were nice to me.”

“That’s good to hear. You were nice to me too.” Sam went further into the room, and crouched down on Tony’s other side. “What are you two playing?”

“Cars.” Tony answered simply, holding one up. “They’re gonna have a taco picnic and then go on an adventure and catch the giant robot.” He pointed at a stuffed robot sitting on the floor a short distance away.

“Tacos and an adventure to capture a giant robot, huh? That sounds pretty fun.” Sam winked at Bucky.

Tony nodded as he dug through the pile of toys for another car, then paused and glanced up at Sam. “You wanna play too?” He held out the car, and there was tentative hope in those big eyes.

Who knew Stark, king of snark, had this kind of cuteness inside him? Sam grinned. “You know what, yeah. It’s been a long time since I played cars. I can get down with that.”

* * *

Rhodey strode through the halls of the Compound at a brisk pace, trying to remain calm. “FRIDAY, I want you to set up an alert to notify me, Pepper, or Happy _every time_ Tony goes anywhere alone.”

“Including the bathroom, sir?”

“Don’t get sassy with me, girlfriend, you know what I mean.”

“Of course not, can’t imagine why I would. Alert is set. Do you have a preferred alarm sound you’d like played? I can access a wide selection of appropriate songs and sound effects.”

“Cute.”

“Was that a no?”

“Yes.”

“Darn shame.”

Shaking his head, Rhodey took an elevator down to the ground floor and finally reached the daycare center. Monday through Friday there was a group of kids and daycare workers in there, but on the weekends it was empty. Honestly, Rhodey hadn’t even realized that Tony knew about the daycare center, which was a stupid assumption, seeing as how Tony had designed the entire Compound, so of course he knew there was a daycare center.

And there he was, completely fine and playing with cars on the floor, though his chosen playmates were still a surprise. Rhodey hadn’t quite believed FRIDAY when she’d told him where Tony was and who he was with, but there was the proof. Bucky Barnes and Sam Wilson were right there on the floor with him, taking turns driving toy cars up and over Tony’s stuffed robot, and then trying to stack them on the other side. 

Apparently it was part of the game, and through the window Rhodey could hear Sam say that it was cheating for Barnes to use the metal arm. Barnes just smirked as he flawlessly stacked his car on top of three others that were precariously wobbling. Sam muttered something too quiet to hear as he took his turn, then swore loudly when the stack fell over.

Tony was giggling up a storm, and he even fell against Barnes’ side when he pointed at Sam and accused him of using a bad word.

Rhodey cracked the door open as Sam pointed right back at him and said, “Don’t you dare, small fry, I’ve heard you use that word so many times it doesn’t even have meaning anymore.”

“Hey, troublemakers.” Rhodey greeted them, smiling when Tony grinned and waved at him energetically.

“Hi, Wo-dey! We’re playing cars!”

“I can see that. You’re still in your pj’s too. Any chance you’ve had breakfast yet? Or told Pepper where you were going?”

Tony paused, looking somewhat guilty. “Ummmm…”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“I forgot. Can I still have coffee?” His big brown eyes went huge and hopeful, all but shining as he begged with them.

“You’re still getting coffee?” Sam asked with a note of incredulity in his voice. “Well damn, it sure is you in there, Stark.” He gave Tony a gentle noogie, which set the kid off giggling again, and swatting at Sam's hands.

Rhodey shook his head, but couldn't stop smiling. “You got him for a sec, Sam? I’d like a word with Bucky, if I could.”

“Yeah, sure thing. He cheats anyway.”

Tony, however, was looking up at Rhodey all wide-eyed and worried, and, it was kinda funny, Barnes had the same expression on his face.

“It’s okay, Tones. I just need to talk to him for a second. You keep playing with Sam and I’ll be right back.”

Again, Tony and Barnes shared identical expressions of doubt, but Barnes nodded and handed his cars to Tony as he got up. “Here, you hold onto those for me, don’t let Sam steal them.” Tony grinned at him and nodded, then shifted over closer to Sam and started stacking cars again.

Rhodey stepped away from the window, wanting a little bit of privacy for this, but before he could say a word, Barnes beat him to it, his face set in stony, determined lines.

“I’ll leave him alone.”

“What?”

“I won’t go near him again. I swear. It was an accident that I saw him, I got lost, I didn’t go looking for him. And I swear I won’t hurt him.”

“I know,” Rhodey interrupted, wanting to stop him before he went farther, “that’s not why I wanted to talk to you.”

Barnes’ eyebrows furrowed, and it was clear he was confused.

Rhodey’s voice softened. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay with the room you had. Steve insisted on putting you next to him, but if you need some space or a quieter area, we can do that. I figured it might be overwhelming, moving in here, and sometimes it’s easier when you’ve got your own space.”

For a moment, Barnes seemed like his brain had stalled out, then he shook himself. “Oh. Uh, no, it’s fine.”

“Okay. You change your mind, you let me know.” Rhodey moved back towards the playroom door, noticing the play of emotions on the guy’s face but not wanting to push. 

“Colonel?”

Rhodey stopped.

There was a pause, then Barnes looked through the playroom window. “He wasn’t like what I expected. Tony.”

“What were you expecting?”

“That he’d hate me. Like he hates Steve.”

Rhodey sighed and folded his arms, wishing he could just climb into everyone’s brains and rearrange things around so that they all finally understood each other. “He doesn’t hate either of you. He’s angry at Steve, yeah. And pretty damn terrified of him, after everything. But he doesn’t hate him.”

“He was scared of me too, at first.”

Rhodey nodded. “I wondered if he would be.”

Barnes shrugged helplessly, suddenly looking lost. “But he still wanted to be friends. He asked me if I’d hurt him, and when I promised I wouldn’t he just… asked me to play cars with him.”

Rhodey couldn’t help but smile. “Yeah. That’s Tony. I know that the whole thing with Steve casts a bad light on it, but Tony really does forgive easy. He always has. I can't begin to count the number of times I've disappointed or unintentionally hurt him, but he always forgives me and it's like it never happened. He's like that with everyone. You just happened to be involved in one of the few instances where there was real pain and betrayal involved. That's harder to get over.”

Barnes nodded, and there was another long pause, but Rhodey waited out, knowing there was more. And finally, Barnes spoke again. “Why doesn’t he hate me?”

That was easy to answer. “Because he knows you never meant to hurt him. What happened before, with Hydra? That wasn’t your fault.”

Barnes couldn’t seem to meet his eyes. “I still did it.”

“But you didn’t _choose_ to. And that makes all the difference. And when you three fought in that bunker, he wasn’t really mad at you. He was mad at Steve, furious and hurt and betrayed and you just happened to be the one that loosed that particular beast. It doesn’t mean he feels that way towards you.” He gestured towards the playroom, the kid inside and the cars on the floor. “Obviously.”

Barnes stared through the window, watching as Tony picked up two cars and started running around the room, jumping and dodging and laughing when he swerved around Sam’s reaching arms. “I wouldn’t blame him for hating me.”

“I know. But he doesn’t. And I’d appreciate it if you kept it that way. Tony has precious few people in his life that he can trust. He could use another one, and based on his behavior around you, you'd got a very good chance of being one of those people. History aside.”

Taking a deep breath, Barnes met Rhodey’s eyes. “I’ll try.”

“Thanks.” Rhodey reached out and clasped his shoulder, noting the way he shuddered slightly. “That’s all I can ask for. Now let’s round those two up and go do some breakfast.”

As if on cue, Barnes’ stomach growled, and Rhodey laughed as he opened the door to the playroom. “Hey, you hooligans, clean up your toys. I’m feeling like bacon and eggs.”


	26. It's Ready

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jane has news for Pepper, who panics a little at the thought of telling Tony.

It was exactly a month from the day Tony was deaged by the time Stephen Strange, Jane Foster, and Thor figured out how to put together and reverse the effects of the machine. Then there was a week of testing, making sure they were doing it right, working out the kinks before they even thought of trying it on Tony. It took a lot of very delicate handling, both with the machinery and with magic, to make it work, and they wanted the process to be as smooth as clockwork.

In the meantime, Tony became buddies with both Bucky and Sam, and the perpetually snarking duo had been worked in as regular Tony-sitters. Bucky had all but exploded out of his shell around Tony and Sam, and while he was still prone to silence and brooding when he was alone or with anyone else, he was alive in a way he hadn’t been in a long time when he was with those two. 

Steve, who had been baffled and somewhat hurt by Tony's instant acceptance of Bucky (unfair, he knew) had kept away from Tony, as well as Natasha and Clint. Tony did better when they weren't around, and it was clear that Tony would need to be back to himself before any further issues were dealt with or apologies made. So they kept their distance, and it was the right thing to do.

Peter stopped by again to see Tony, and though no webbing happened this time, they still ended up in Tony’s private workshop surrounded by a mess (they had torn apart the engine of a car with help from Dum-E, U, and Strange’s Cloak of Levitation, fondly dubbed “Levy”). And that was before they’d gotten out a whole bunch more stuff so Tony could give Dum-E and U the blinky lights and rainbow light-up wheels he’d promised them a few weeks ago.

Then the day finally arrived.

“It’s ready.” Jane told Pepper late one morning, having stopped by her work-from-home SI office. “All three of us are confident that we’ve got it working properly, and we’re ready whenever you guys are.”

Pepper felt a little woozy at the huge wave of both terror and relief that swamped her, sending her heart racing. “You’re sure?”

Jane nodded once, assertively. “Absolutely. We wouldn’t risk it unless we were confident it would work.”

There was another minute or two of explanation, but Pepper wasn’t really paying attention to it. Her mind was consumed by every worst case scenario imaginable, and she had broken out in a cold sweat. 

Jane must have sensed her rising panic, because not five minutes after the scientist left, Rhodey was coming in.

“Hey, Pepper. Talk to me.” His voice was quiet, but strong, and Pepper blindly reached for his hand.

“Where’s Tony?”

Rhodey squeezed her hand firmly and squatted down next to her chair, his leg braces making their quiet mechanical noises. “He’s with Happy. FRIDAY told them that Darcy Lewis came over to see Jane again, and Tony likes her. I don’t know where he was hiding it, but he ran into your master bathroom and came back out again a minute later with a box of those cookies he likes, said he’s gonna share them with her.”

Pepper laughed, though it was a little strained, but with Rhodey there to talk her through it, the panic started fading. “Jane said they’re ready. They’ve got the machine ready.”

“That’s good news.” Rhodey said, almost as if he were reminding her. “Tony as a kid is probably the cutest and most hilarious thing that I’ve ever experienced, but I miss the goatee’d version, personally.”

“I do too.” Her voice broke at the end. “I miss him so much. He’s still him, but he’s not him.”

Rhodey squeezed her shoulder gently. “I know. And it’s okay to be worried. I am too. Wasn’t sure if they really would figure it out.”

“I think that’s why I’m so—” Pepper gestured at herself, the panic she'd found herself in. “I didn’t really let myself think past this point.”

“It’s gonna be okay. Doc Foster is one of the top ten smartest scientists in the world, Thor grew up around magic, and Strange isn’t the Sorcerer Supreme for nothing. And he’s got that medical background going for him too. They’ve been doing tests all week, I’ve watched a few of them, and they’ve got it figured out. It’s all gonna be fine.”

Pepper took a deep breath and nodded. “You’re right. I know.”

“Course I am. It’s me.”

As she chuckled, Rhodey got to his feet. “Now all that’s left to do is to tell Tony and Happy, and get this done.”

“You make it sound so easy.” Pepper rested her chin in her hand as she leaned on her desk, looking up at him.

“No sense in complicating it before we get there. You want me to have FRIDAY get him up here?”

She considered it for a minute, chewing on the inside of her lip. “No. Not yet. Let him play with Darcy. I bet Sam and Bucky will join them soon too. Let him have the rest of today, at least until this afternoon.” She smiled wistfully. “Let him play and have fun while he’s got the chance.”

* * *

Tony ended up having to dig out two more boxes of his secret stash of cookies when Bucky and Sam showed up in the communal living room to crash his playdate with Darcy (Girl Day Thursday had come around again). She had downloaded Tetris and an old school Snake game onto her phone, and all four heads ended up crowded around the small screen, talking over each other and bossing each other around as they took turns playing. Then Tony found the music on her phone again, one thing led to another, Darcy was collected by Jane, and then somehow there was a dance moves contest going on between Tony, Sam, and Bucky while the big stereo blared classic rock.

“Yeah, you might think you’ve got the moves, but you’ve been on ice for most of the past seventy years.” Sam was shouting as he spun around and swiveled his hips.

Bucky lobbed a decorative pillow at his face, and another one in Tony’s direction, as he did some kind of complicated dance move that looked distinctly 40’s and had a lot of fancy footwork. “You look like you’ve got poison ivy down your drawers, I’m not sure what moves you mean.”

Tony was bouncing on his knees on the couch, laughing fit to burst as he watched the two adults argue and start shoving at each other like children. Of course, that was what Pepper walked in on, her hands over her ears and her eyes wide. She grinned when Tony looked over at her, raising both hands in the air, and she could tell he was saying her name though she couldn’t hear him. 

She grabbed the stereo remote off the side table and muted the music, which made Bucky and Sam nearly fall over, they were so surprised by the sudden silence. They spotted her a second later, and both of them blushed as they stood up straight, Sam’s shirk askew around his torso and Bucky’s hair half undone and falling out of the bun he’d pulled it back into.

“Peppoh, we’re dancing!” Tony shouted, still bouncing on the couch.

“Oh, is that what you were doing?” Pepper couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at Sam and Bucky, who looked like they wanted to fall through the floor. She winked at them as she smirked, then caught Tony up in her arms, blowing a raspberry on the side of his neck to make him giggle.

“I need to borrow you, honey. That okay?”

Tony nodded and flung his arms around her neck. “Yeah. Can we have a snack?”

Pepper glanced over at the three empty cookie boxes lined up on the kitchen counter. “I doubt you need one, but I think fruit or veggies could be arranged.”

“Blueberries?” Tony gasped hopefully.

“Maybe, let’s go check the fridge. Thanks for hanging out with him, you two.”

Bucky and Sam smiled and waved, both still a little pink-cheeked with embarrassment, though they grinned at Tony as the kid tried to wink at them over Pepper’s shoulder and only succeeded in awkwardly blinking both eyes.

Pepper waited until they were both settled cross-legged on their bed with a plate of cut fruit between them (Tony had moved all the blueberries to his side of the plate) before trying to broach the subject. She hadn’t figured out how to word it yet when Tony popped a blueberry in his mouth and asked, “Are we gonna have a seer-yus convosation?”

She blinked a few times, certainly not expecting him to say that. “What do you mean? How do you know?”

He shrugged and poked at a halved grape until it had created a triangle of space between the cubed pineapple and an apple slice, with three blueberries in the middle. “We always sit on the bed and have a snack when we have a seer-yus convosation.”

Thinking about it, Pepper realized that he was right. Every time she planned for the both of them to have a serious conversation, this was what she did. 

“Because then we won’t be hungry before we’re done, and we can cuddle after.” Tony mumbled around a mouthful of more blueberries. His big, beautiful brown Bambi eyes were looking up at her, so open and trusting.

For a moment, she almost forgot what those eyes looked like when they were staring at her from an adult face, with laugh lines and crow’s feet and silver showing in his hair and goatee.

“You’re right, sweetheart. We do need to have a serious conversation. But, it’s about a good thing.”

Tony just nodded, loading the last of the blueberries into his small hands. “Okay. I’m ready.”

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Pepper gave him the news.


	27. Aged Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The machine is finished, and all there is to do is put it to use and hope for the best.

They planned it for the next morning. Pepper wanted one more night before facing whatever happened with the machine that had caused so much trouble, so she and Rhodey and Happy had all gotten together for one more night with their tiny Tony. They had spaghetti for dinner, which Tony got everywhere with his enthusiastic pasta slurping, and then had ice cream sundaes and watched Pete's Dragon while they all crowded on the couch. 

"I want a dragon." Tony commented at one point, absently stirring the melted ice cream in his bowl while his eyes were glued to the screen.

"You've got two robots, an AI, and you're Iron Man. I'm pretty sure a dragon would just be grossly excessive at this point." Happy replied casually, just as sucked into the movie as Tony was.

Pepper didn't sleep much, but she held Tony all night, listening to him breathe, watching his little chest rise and fall, and feeling his soft, loose curls under her cheek. She couldn't help but catalog every moment, a part of her still braced for the worst case scenario the following day. She was trembling when the four of them walked down to the lab that held the reconstructed machine, and she had to remind herself not to hold Tony's small hand too tight.

“It’s big.” Tony said as he looked up at the machine. It had taken over half of one of the extra labs that he and Bruce used to use for bigger projects. “Is it s'posed to be this big?”

“We had to add a few things to it.” Stephen answered, watching as his Cloak took off and wrapped itself affectionately around Tony. “But it works just fine.”

“When we’re all ready, Tony, you’re gonna come stand right over here.” Jane held out her hand to him, and he shifted his stuffed robot to one arm so he could take it. He was wearing an odd, cobbled together sort of outfit, retrofitted from the nanotech clothes he had been working on for Bruce before the whole Ultron thing. It resembled a sort of ill-fitting jumpsuit, and it didn’t look very comfortable, but it would grow with his body when the deaging was reversed.

Jane led Tony to an area of the floor across from the machine. “See, we’ve got this part of the floor treated with shock absorbers and it’s lined with rubber, so the energy we’re using doesn’t cause any problems. And these receptors will help channel and control the energy so it doesn’t get out of control.”

“They’re big overflow resistant fuses.” Tony saying those words in his child's voice made the scientist grin.

“That’s exactly right, I should have known you’d figure it out. You little mechanical genius.”

Despite his obvious nervousness, Tony was able to smile up at her. She showed him around the rest of the machine while Thor and Strange gave Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy a rundown of what would happen, and then there was nothing to do but put it into action.

“You ready?” Stephen asked, his voice uncharacteristically gentle as he looked down at the little boy still wrapped in the Cloak. Pepper had to swallow hard when Tony looked at her, fear flickering on his face.

“I think so?”

Kneeling down, she held her arms out to him. “Come here, honey.”

The Cloak unwrapped from around his shoulders, going back to Stephen as Tony ran to Pepper and flung himself into her embrace. She could feel his little heart hammering in his chest, and she rocked him back and forth a little as she held him.

“It’s going to be okay, sweetie. I promise. Stephen and Jane and Thor all know what they’re doing, they did a really good job, and it’s all gonna be okay.”

Tony nodded but didn’t speak, just clung to her tightly, his robot squashed awkwardly under one arm.

With one more hug, Pepper eased him back carefully and smiled at him, cupping his little face in her hand and kissing his forehead. “I love you, Tony.”

He managed a trembly smile in return. “I love you, Peppoh.”

Rhodey scooped him up next, giving him a bear hug and whispering something in his ear. Then Happy had a turn, though he seemed a little too emotional to speak.

"You hold my robot," Tony said when Happy put him down, pressing the stuffed toy into his friend's arms. "Keep him safe."

Then Pepper held his hand and led him over to where Jane had shown him, placing him in the center of the energy receptors. It took every bit of strength in her to step back a safe distance away.

“Let’s get it going.” Strange said quietly, nodding at Jane and Thor. The three of them got busy, flipping switches and bringing the machine to life, the noise of it sounding loud in the relatively small space.

Tony’s eyes were huge with fear, and he swallowed hard as he looked at Pepper, Happy, and Rhodey.

“I’m scared,” he whispered, the words barely audible over the sound of the machine powering up, and it broke all three of their hearts.

“I know, sweetheart,” Pepper said, raising her voice so he could hear her. “I know you are, I am too. But it’ll be over in just a minute, okay?”

“You’ve got this, Tones. You’re the bravest guy I know.” Rhodey smiled at him, forcing it to look real when all he wanted to do was go over there and hold onto Tony, so he didn’t have to be there all alone and scared.

Happy couldn’t speak at all. He just held the stuffed robot in his arms and watched the little boy with a stricken expression on his face, and Pepper knew it was going against everything in him to have to stand away, to not protect Tony from what was coming.

“Ready?” Strange looked around at them from where he was standing next to Jane at the controls, his hands already busy conjuring up a complex pattern of sparks in the air. “Stay right there, Tony. Just hold still for me.”

Tony’s lips were trembling, and his hands were clenched in fists so tight the tiny knuckles were white.

“Almost done, Tony, you can do this!” Jane called to him, giving him a thumbs up and an encouraging smile.

“Thor,” Stephen said with a nod to the demigod, and Thor lifted Mjolnir, calling the lightning forth. It channeled perfectly into the machine they had put together, and Jane watched the controls with intensity. Stephen worked his own magic, stabilizing the power source of the lightning and muttering an incantation, and as soon as the machine beeped to signify its readiness, Jane flipped a lever and slammed her hand on a button to discharge it.

Pepper’s fingers were numb with how hard she was holding Rhodey’s and Happy’s hands, and she couldn’t breathe as the receptors around Tony suddenly glowed bright white with energy. His silhouette flared with it as the surge surrounded his body, and his scream of fear and pain made everyone in the room flinch as the flash of light blinded them.

It was over quick, which was a blessing because Pepper was one thin inch from having to be held back. The light dimmed fast, leaving them all blinking, and Pepper and Rhodey were mostly blind as they stumbled towards the figure lying on the floor where Tony had been a moment before.

“Did it work?!” Happy was shouting, looking almost terrified to go closer, his face white. “Someone tell me if it worked!”

Pepper was on her knees, her heart in her throat as she reached out. _He was back_ , Tony was back, in the right body and the right age, but he was sprawled motionless on the floor, the nanotech jumpsuit having expanded to fit. Hands shaking, Pepper cupped his face in her hands, still blinking spots out of her vision as she rubbed her thumbs over his facial hair, saw the slight glint of silver at his temples.

“Tony. Tony, look at me. Open your eyes.”

Rhodey had one of his hands clasped in a tight grip, and the other was reaching to press at Tony’s throat, searching for a pulse. Stephen, Jane, Thor, and Happy were all crowded around now, looking down anxiously, and Jane swore quietly.

“He’s breathing! Look, he’s breathing!”

Unable to control the way her entire body was trembling, Pepper looked at his chest, and sure enough, she could see the way it was rising and falling. Leaning down, she pressed her ear to it, right over his heart, shuddering with relief when she heard it beating.

“Come on, Tones,” Rhodey was urging quietly, squeezing his hand. “Wake up for us. Come on.”

“We could use Banner’s Hulk right now,” Thor murmured under his breath. “That beast’s mighty roar was enough to scare life back into him once before.”

“He’s alive, he’s just—” 

Whatever Tony was got cut off when those eyes suddenly flew open, and Tony gasped. Everyone jumped, then jumped again when he loudly yelped, “Damn it, OW! What the hell?!”

Pepper went absolutely to pieces. Flinging herself over Tony like a heroine at the end of a movie, she awkwardly wrapped her arms around him and sobbed. Rhodey, looking distinctly pale, sat back with a thump, dragging his hand down his face. Happy also sat down abruptly, face shining with sweat as he all but hyperventilated. Jane sagged against Thor, swearing colorfully, and the demigod stared down at Tony with an enormous grin on his face.

“It is good to have you back,” He said, leaning down to clap a hand on the shoulder Pepper wasn’t crying on.

“I go somewhere?” Tony asked, looking around at all of them wildly, patting Pepper’s back out of reflex more than anything else. “What just happened?”

Stephen leaned in and ran a quick check on his vitals, face tense with concentration. But finally he sat back, looking almost haggard with relief.

“I think it worked.”

* * *

“Someone better start explaining this to me right now!” Tony felt on the edge of hysterics, still flat on his back on his lab floor, and Rhodey pulled himself together enough to coax Pepper off him.

“You scared us to hell and back is what happened,” He answered Tony, getting himself and Pepper to their feet while Happy and some guy wearing funky medieval clothes and a cape helped Tony. “Any chance you remember being kidnapped by a psychopath hell-bent on immortality a few weeks ago?”

Tony wobbled a little, suddenly dizzy, but reaching for Pepper all the same. “Uh… maybe? It’s… I’ve got some weird brain stuff going on, I’m not sure what all that’s about.”

“You’ve been deaged,” Pepper managed to get out. “You were deaged into your five-year-old body, and we’ve been trying to figure out how to get you back for the past five weeks.”

Tony squinted, attempting to make sense of it all, when a soft, heavy weight was draped over his shoulders.

“Am I in shock, is this a shock blanket?” He muttered, holding on to Rhodey with one hand and keeping an arm around Pepper with the other. He glanced down at his shoulder, but his view was blocked by a burgundy collar. Some kind of... cloak that was _moving on its own_ had arranged itself over Tony’s shoulders, and the high collar was brushing lightly at his cheeks, and teasing at his hair.

Something flickered in his brain, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on, and his jaw dropped a moment later when it came to him.

“Um..." He gestured towards the cosplayer dude he kind of recognized. "You. Whoever you are. Doctor... something, I think. Did this cloak thing happen to develop a very determined crush on me at any time in recent days, perhaps?”

“Yes,” The man answered immediately. “Wrapped around you and didn’t let go for a few days, actually. Seemed pretty determined about it.”

“I… just might remember that.” Tony decided, then his knees buckled. “I also think I might pass out for a little bit. Good work, guys.”


	28. Back To Normal?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony's back in his normal body again. But he's not sure how to handle everything else that has probably changed.

Tony spent the day in bed, with a near-constant entourage scattered around the penthouse suite. Pepper was all but glued to his side, except for once or twice when she excused herself to go cry. (She was good at hiding it, but Tony could see the signs of it when she came back, smiling just a little too brightly under slightly puffy eyes.) Jane, Stephen Strange (who was apparently a sorcerer), and Thor took turns explaining what they knew about what had happened, how they’d collaborated to find a solution with Tony’s help.

“How about that, deaged and still a legit genius,” He quipped weakly, smiling when he saw Rhodey roll his eyes fondly. Honeybear was another one that hadn’t left the room for more than two minutes at a time, and Happy was ducking in and out so often Tony finally had to badger him into sitting down and just staying. 

The weirdest was when _Bucky Barnes_ and Sam Wilson stopped by, not coming in to see him, but they had handed off a bouquet of flowers, a bunch of balloons, and a little basket full of… Legos and matchbox cars. Tony had stared at the toys for a solid minute and a half, running through the memories that he had of becoming friends, actual real _friends_ , with the ex-Winter Soldier. Huh. He’d have to… dwell on that. Especially the part in which he had really enjoyed it, and automatically felt like smiling and felt no fear or animosity at all when he thought of Bucky and Sam.

“You’re remembering it all?” Strange asked as they all ate dinner together that night, the crappy Americanized Chinese from the restaurant nearby that Tony loved.

Tony nodded as he stuffed half an eggroll into his mouth. “Yup. Weird, though. Not like my other memories.”

“That’s not terribly surprising,” Jane pitched in, shamelessly stealing a cream cheese wonton out of Thor’s takeout container. “As far as we could tell, you had all your memories from your whole life. They were just filtered through your mind the way a child would understand and interpret it. Makes sense that it would work the same way now that you’re back in your normal-size brain. The memories that you made are recollections of a five-year-old, so your understanding and interpretation of what happened are according to the age you were when they happened.”

“It’s _weird_ ,” Tony repeated, glaring at Rhodey when the guy tried to hide a grin in his orange chicken.

Normally, Tony would have been rushing to get back to work, get out of bed, just do something to keep himself busy. But… this time he didn’t do that. And sure, part of it was the lingering exhaustion that was apparently a side effect from having your body aggressively aged up forty-odd years in the span of a second. A bigger part, however, was that some of those tricky new memories he had were making him quite unenthusiastic about leaving his room.

Thor had brought it up first, mentioning the other ex-Avengers, telling Tony that they’d been worried sick, asking after him constantly.

Tony had given him a flat look and snorted. He still couldn’t analyze some of the memories he had from being deaged, but he remembered enough. Enough that if he didn’t keep himself in check, his heart would start pounding with residual, remembered fear.

It was disturbing to realize it, to remember how afraid he’d been. He’d had it buried so deep, covered with layer after layer of pain and stubbornness and a refusal to dig up all the emotional baggage tied to his ex-teammates. But it was fear nonetheless, a core of fear and distrust that had come right to the forefront when he didn’t have his adult mind to shield it away.

He felt almost sick with shame that he'd been so transparent, vulnerable and horrifically honest (though there was a very definite sense of relief there as well, but he wasn't looking too closely at it). And now that it had all come out, that everyone knew exactly what had been hiding under all his masks and behind all his walls… he didn’t know what to do. How should he act, now that everybody knew, and how would they treat him, after all that. 

He wasn’t sure if he ever wanted to find out.

* * *

When Tony and Pepper went to bed that night, their suite finally cleared out to leave them alone together, their routine fell back into place as easy as anything. However, as they laid in bed, with Pepper curled up under Tony’s arm and holding his hand over his chest, it still felt like it had been a long, long time since they’d done it last.

Pepper idly stroked his hand, the weight of their individual thoughts nearly palpable in the air.

“You know,” She murmured into the quiet, “I used to wish sometimes, when you let something slip about your childhood, that I could go back in time to when you were a kid. So I could hug you, and tell you everything was gonna be okay.”

She felt his hand twitch slightly, but it took awhile for him to reply. “Guess you got your chance.”

“I did.” She swallowed hard. “But you know what? It wasn’t enough.” Her voice broke despite her best efforts to remain calm. “Tony, why didn’t you ever tell me? Why didn’t you ever tell me how bad it was, all of it? Not just your dad, but everything else too? Everything with the Avengers?” She felt a tear slip out of the corner of her eye and drop onto Tony’s t-shirt. “I knew it was bad, but I never knew it was that bad.”

He curled his arm tighter around her, pressing a kiss to her temple. “I didn’t want you to know. I didn’t want anyone to know, not even me. I… I just buried it so deep that I didn’t even know it was there most of the time. And if it wasn’t there, it couldn’t…”

“Couldn’t hurt you.” Pepper finished for him, and Tony nodded, sighing a little. “You need therapy.”

That made him huff out a chuckle. “I know. Wanna go therapist shopping tomorrow? Maybe there’s a two-for-one special, disaster men and the very stressed out women in their lives.”

She giggled, but nodded, knowing that he was being serious in his offer.

They went quiet again, and Tony was just getting to the point that his breaths were getting slow and even for sleep when Pepper whispered, “If we ever have kids, I want them to be exactly like you.”

He didn’t say anything, he didn’t make any noise at all. But Pepper still knew, from the way his chest trembled, that there were tears trickling down the sides of his face.

She didn’t call him out on it. She just hugged him a little tighter and let her own tears fall.

* * *

“Mr. Stark!”

Tony barely had time to catch a glimpse of Peter the next afternoon before he was being hugged so hard he actually couldn’t breathe. And his arms were trapped too, so he had to resort to desperately poking at the kid until he loosened his arms enough so that Tony could draw in a breath.

“I am always very impressed by your crazy spider strength, kid, but I don’t necessarily need a practical demonstration.” He wheezed a little bit, clutching his chest.

Peter looked apologetic. “Sorry! I was just really excited. Miss Potts texted to tell me you were back to yourself, and I couldn’t wait to come over!”

Tony smiled and patted the kid’s arm. “That’s sweet, thanks.”

Grinning, Peter went back in for another hug, this time not squeezing quite so hard, and with his arms around Tony’s middle so his arms were free.

Feeling slightly awkward, Tony didn’t move for a second, his arms hovering a little bit in the air. But then… he wrapped his arms around the kid, hugging him back.

And it felt awesome.


	29. Progress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony meets with the Avengers for the first time since he's been aged back up, and things seem to be slowly progressing.

Tony’s first time meeting the Avengers after he was aged back up was… well. Yeah.

He leaned against the wall in the hallway afterwards, once he’d rounded a few corners and gotten away from the communal living room. He could feel the way his heart was pounding almost out of his chest, and was trying to figure out if he was on the brink of a panic attack or not. 

“FRIDAY? Can you check with Pepper and see if she’s busy?”

“I’ve been given standing orders to ensure that she’s not busy if you need her, boss. She was very firm about it.”

Tony dropped his head, swallowing hard. He didn’t deserve that woman. He really didn’t. “She in a meeting or on a call?”

“No, she’s not. She’s also on her way, she’ll meet you in the penthouse.”

And she did. Pepper didn’t ask anything when she came in, just went straight where Tony was standing awkwardly by the couch and wrapped her arms around him. He knew he was shaking slightly, that she’d be able to feel it, and that his skin probably felt all clammy.

“I’m here,” She whispered in his ear, rubbing his back with one hand and burying the other in his hair. “I’m here.”

Tony shuddered and let himself lean into her embrace a little, trying not to feel embarrassed about the way he craved it, the way it made him feel comforted and safe. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare ever be sorry for needing me, Tony Stark.” Her voice shook, and he could hear the tears in her voice. She held him for another minute, until he had calmed down a little bit, then tugged him over to sit on the couch.

“FRIDAY said you’d just seen them. How did it go?”

Tony took a shuddering breath. “They’re being different. All of them. Steve keeps looking at me like he’s about to cry, and he’s thanking me for _everything_. Thor spent five minutes apologizing so sincerely I think he actually teared up. Clint made me coffee and was being all friendly, and then Natasha hugged me. I… I don’t understand.”

“I’m not surprised. It was… an extremely rude awakening for them, when you were deaged. To realize what you really felt, what they were really like.”

Tony’s eyebrows furrowed, and he stared down at his hands, perplexed. “They’re being… nice. They’ve never been nice before.”

Pepper’s breath hitched, but Tony wasn’t sure if it was because she was upset or really pissed. “Well, they are now.”

“It’s… it’s weird. I feel like I’m paranoid, constantly waiting for the _gotcha_. Like it’s not going to last, and I don’t want to get used to it. I really don’t. Because it would be worse to get used to it and then have it taken away again. I just… I can’t do that again, Pepper. I can’t.”

Pepper tugged at him until he spread out along the couch with her, his head resting on her chest as she stroked his hair. “I know, honey. It’ll be okay. Just give it some time. It’ll all be okay.”

* * *

It was kiiiiiind of amusing to see the hint of terror on the ex-Avengers’ faces when Pepper asked to talk to them the next day, while Tony was busy with Rhodey working on his braces. She kept her smile to herself, however, and maintained her calm, professional demeanor.

“I just wanted to let you know, Tony just about had a panic attack yesterday after he met with you.”

All four of them immediately opened their mouths, their eyes wide with a whole lot of emotions, but she held up a hand for silence.

“I know. I know you were all nice to him. Very nice, the way he tells it.” She paused, making sure they’d let her continue. “But I thought you need to know that he doesn’t trust it. Not yet. It’s a very abrupt change, and he’s going to be paranoid about it for awhile. He doesn’t want to believe it’s real and get used to it, only to have it taken away. He’s waiting for the ‘gotcha’ moment when he finds out it was a trick and it all goes back to how it was before.”

She could read the dismay, sadness, and shame on their faces, and despite the circumstances, she was glad they finally understood.

“Be patient with him. Please. Don’t give up on him. He just needs time. He needs time to believe it’s real. You should all know by now that he’s got the biggest and softest heart of any of us. It won’t take long. More than anything, Tony Stark just desperately wants to love and be loved by his family. Give him a chance to get there.”

“We will.” Steve promised, almost stumbling over his words in his enthusiasm to say them, his voice rough. “All the time he needs.”

Natasha, Clint, and Thor all nodded fervently in agreement, and Pepper rather thought that she could have asked for the moon just then, and they would have gone after it. For Tony.

It was the kind of thing that made a person hope.

“Thank you.” She murmured. As she walked away, she thought that maybe, just maybe, if things went well… She might even find it in her heart to forgive them too.

* * *

“Tony!”

Even though he was prepared, he had walked himself up the stairs and into the communal area and was ready for it, Tony still jumped a little when Steve said his name. The guy sounded… pleased to see him, excited, and damn if that wasn’t odd.

“Hey,” He waved, which just felt stupid, but Steve’s smile didn’t dim.

He was standing at the stove in the kitchen, stirring something in a big pot. Blue boxes littered the counter, and Tony raised his eyebrows. “Mac and cheese?”

Steve nodded. “Yeah, it’s one of Sam’s favorites, he and Bucky are just finishing up in the gym, then we’re gonna have lunch and maybe watch a movie or something.” He glanced at Tony, his blue eyes wide and hopeful. “Do you wanna join us?”

Tony had edged closer, close enough that he could see the bright yellow noodles Steve was stirring in the pan. “I haven’t had Kraft mac and cheese since college. Rhodey and I had it all the time, it was one of the things he could afford on his food budget.”

Steve opened his mouth to ask a question, but nothing came out, and a second later he snapped his mouth shut. He looked as if he were thinking hard, his jaw working a little bit, and it was kind of fascinating to watch. Finally, he tried again.

“You were roommates, right?”

Tony nodded. “Yeah.”

“Oh. Were you on a food budget too?” Steve looked uncertain, like he wasn’t sure he wanted to ask the question. Tony briefly wondered what that was about, since Steve didn’t usually watch his words or hesitate like that.

“Not really, not like he was. I usually got takeout on my dinner nights. I’ve always been a lousy cook, I didn’t want to inflict that on him every other day.”

Steve’s face changed again, like he’d solved some kind of puzzle, and he smiled at Tony again. It was… utterly bewildering.

“So you took turns cooking. Or, providing dinner. Bucky and I did that too, he liked to bring home food instead of cooking it.” Steve got out bowls for the mac and cheese, then started dishing up. There were four bowls, and he cast another one of those hopeful glances at Tony. “You okay with joining us? You didn’t say for sure. You don’t have to,” he said quickly, “just if you want to. You’re welcome to.”

So Tony found himself sitting down to a boxed mac and cheese lunch with Captain America, the ex-Winter Soldier, and Falcon. And it was… nice. Steve was still overly courteous, all hopeful smiles and cautious words. Sam was the most normal, just acting like it was lunch with friends and there was nothing weird about it. Bucky was a mix of the two, and a little bit deer-in-the-headlights, as if he couldn’t quite make up his mind how to act. Although, when he thought about it later, Tony figured that was probably because he didn’t know how Tony would act either. Tony didn't know how he'd act himself.

A few weeks of being besties while he was deaged did not an uncomplicated adult-age friendship make.

But it was a step in the right direction, and by the end of lunch, Tony and Bucky had managed to banter a little bit, which was a key part of any friendship Tony had. Tony still felt a little paranoid and jumpy, and he declined their offer to stick around and hang out. But he didn’t feel a panic attack coming on when he left the communal area. He didn’t feel like throwing up, or running away, or having to call Pepper.

It was progress.


	30. Tentative Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony is starting to think that maybe, just maybe, he can trust the changes in the way his teammates treat him

It happened several times over the next few weeks. Tony would make an effort to go to the communal area once a day, and at least half the time either Sam, Steve, Bucky, Natasha, Clint, or Thor was there, sometimes more than one. They had meals together, watched a couple of movies together, chatted awkwardly, played a few boardgames, even spent part of one afternoon listening to Thor read aloud from a book of Norse fairytales. He had to stop frequently to correct parts of the book, but he was a good reader, his voice was pleasant to listen to, and Tony was able to just sit and listen and watch the people that he was slowly starting to get to know again.

Rhodey came with him sometimes too, and that was always more comfortable. Tony felt like he could open up a little more when Rhodey was around. He’d be safe. Pepper only came once or twice, and while it wasn’t hard to figure out that she had a long way to go before she’d be able to be friendly with them again, Tony appreciated that she tried.

He was still, in the back of his mind, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Even while he very hesitantly started to believe that maybe it was all real, he still felt like it could change at any moment.

They seemed to be doing their damndest to convince him otherwise. Clint had gone out of his way to make coffee for him every time Tony came to the communal area. He was awkward about it, but he’d kind of struck up a bantering sort of friendship, gently teasing, but never saying anything even slightly hurtful. It was a radical change from how it had been when the ex-Avengers had first gotten back, and Tony still found himself flinching slightly when Clint opened his mouth. But that was slowly going away. Clint seemed to be making a concentrated effort to be, well, friendly. Which Tony had seen before, but never directed at him, and he was uneasy about how much he knew he could _like_ Clint, if this all wasn’t a big trick.

He kept catching Steve looking at him, with an expression of absolute heartbreak and regret on his face, though he’d always look quickly away, like he didn’t want Tony to see it. He always smiled when he saw Tony, thanked him for every little thing, talked to him like he was a friend rather than someone he had to tolerate. And he always invited Tony to join them, but never pressured him. The stalwart and commanding Captain America and his expression of constant disappointment and disdain seemed to have disappeared, and Tony just didn’t know what to do with that.

Thor had apologized so many times that Tony had to beg him to stop. The demigod would get himself into such a tizzy of sincerity that it was almost painful to watch, and Tony had no choice but to believe him. Especially when Thor backed up his apologies with his actions, always asking how Tony was doing, if he was sleeping well, if he was eating, if his headache from yesterday was better, how Pepper and Rhodey and Happy were, how the bots were doing, and on and on. Tony had no idea how detailed his life was until Thor started asking about all those details regularly. And he was sincerely interested in the answers. There was an air of respect about him, too, whenever Thor talked to Tony. Tony couldn’t really recall any of the Avengers actually respecting him before, not even as Iron Man, so this was… really weird.

Sam was much the same as he’d been before. He and Tony hadn’t ever really gotten to know each other, but they’d been friendly. It was just more now, there was a more concentrated effort. When Sam found out that Tony was in the market for a therapist, he’d made several recommendations, and seemed proud that Tony was making the effort. Like Clint, he liked to tease and banter, though it lacked the extremely careful handling that Clint’s did.

Bucky could go from teasing to shy to terse and back again all in five minutes, but that and his general nervousness around Tony slowly got better too. When Thor had asked about the bots, Bucky’s eyes had lit up, and he’d blurted out a question before he could stop himself. Tony hadn’t ever known that Bucky was a bit of a science nerd, and the expression on his face when Tony showed him the lab for the first time… it was a delight. It took work, real work and a lot of wrangling some very complicated and deep emotions, but Tony was able to work with his therapist (one that Sam recommended) to create a foundation that he and Bucky could build a friendship on. So far, it was very promising, and Tony could see Bucky becoming one of his best friends.

Natasha was at the same time the easiest and the most surprising. Tony was convinced that it was just part of their thing, how they put on their best, most subtle public faces around each other, and pretended to be good friends while knowing under it all they still regarded each other with suspicion. That was how it had been ever since the doughnut shop, when Tony had first found out she was with SHIELD, and anything else had seemed impossible.

But then one night, after working in the lab for awhile, Tony had opened up a file he’d forgotten about, a project he and Bruce had been working on before Ultron happened and his Science Bro disappeared.

A wave of sorrow had taken Tony by surprise, and he hadn’t been able to get to sleep because of it. He just… he really missed Bruce. He hadn’t had a lot of real friends before, just Rhodey and Happy and Pepper. But he and Bruce had clicked from that first day, and it had been the perfect friendship ever since. Bruce hadn't been afraid to call Tony out on his bullshit, Tony hadn't been afraid to tease him, they had both respected the heck out of each other's work, and it made for a relationship that had been real and meaningful.

Before everyone had come back, and he’d slowly shut himself away in his and Pepper’s suite, Tony had taken to wandering around the Compound at night when he couldn’t sleep or settle to a project. He started doing so again, now that things were on the mend, meandering through the halls with his hands in his pajama pockets, slippers making soft noises on the floor. FRIDAY would light the way ahead, then turn it off behind him, so he wasn’t walking in the dark.

He ended up on the balcony outside the communal area, resting his elbows on the railing and looking out over the grounds. He hadn't been out there long when Natasha found him. 

He heard her coming, which he knew was intentional, and so didn’t startle when she joined him at the railing.

“Can’t sleep?” She asked softly, and he could hear the faint smile in her voice.

“Nah. Thinking.”

“What about? If it’s okay that I ask.”

Tony glanced at her, measuring her expression, searching for the tiny tells that would reveal the angle she was working. He could identify a lot of them, he’d put a significant amount of research into not being fooled by her again. But… he couldn’t spot any now.

“Bruce.” He finally answered, looking away. “Just missing Bruce.”

She sighed and nodded. “He’s been gone a long time. I miss him too.”

“What were you two?” Tony asked, the question having been on his mind for ages. “If it’s okay that I ask.”

She smiled again, just a little bit, and shook her head. “I don’t know. It could have been a lot of things, but… we didn’t really get a chance to explore much of anything. I think…” She hesitated, and Tony saw the way her eyes didn’t seem focused, like she was seeing something other than the view in front of them.

“I think we could have been friends. Like Clint and I am. I wanted for us to be friends. We weren’t there yet, we were both still kind of feeling our way around it, trying to get past the issues with the Hulk and… me being who I am.” She wasn’t apologizing for it, for the person she was, the people she could be. But she did sound, for a moment, as if she might regret some of it. “But I think we could have gotten there, in the end. I saw how it was like with you. The way you made him happy. He smiled like he meant it around you.”

Natasha looked at Tony, and he was surprised to see a glimmer of tears in her eyes. He’d seen a lot of things in her eyes, everything from humor to hate to calculation to love, depending on who or what she was looking at. But he’d never seen tears.

“I think I just wanted some of that. I wanted to make him smile too. I wanted to be able to make him happy just by being near him. I can do that with Clint. And Steve too, and Thor gives out his friendship so easily. Sometimes, I think that maybe you and I can get there too, if we can learn how to trust each other. But now I worry that I won’t ever get my chance with Bruce.”

Natasha’s voice broke, and she turned away again, closing her eyes against the tears glittering on her eyelashes. 

These were real tears. Tony wasn’t sure exactly how he knew, especially because this was the Black Widow, and she had managed to crack everyone from Russian mobsters to the god of mischief with her skill at emotional manipulation. 

These tears were real. She was actually letting herself be vulnerable, and Tony saw it for the expression of trust that it was.

Moving just a little closer, Tony let his arm press against hers. Enough that she would know he was there, that she wasn’t alone.

“You know, he might still be out there, somewhere.” He said quietly, risking a glance upwards. Stars still made him nervous, made him feel like he was dancing too close to the edge of a nightmare. He could look quick though, one brief look at the heavens above them.

“You think so?” Natasha whispered, wiping away the two tears that had slid down her cheeks.

“It’s possible. More than possible. We know we’re not the only ones in the universe, and there are ways to get from place to place. Maybe he ended up riding on a moonbeam, and he’s out there on some far-flung planet, wowing the locals with his science powers.”

A rough, wet chuckle startled out of her. “He’d hate that. The attention.”

“He would.” Tony leaned against her for a second, jostling her gently. “But it would mean he’s still out there. And maybe he’ll find his way home. We shouldn’t give up on him yet.”

With a slow, deep sigh, Natasha nodded, tipping her face up to look at the stars herself. “You’re right. Shouldn’t give up on him yet.”

“Maybe never.” He suggested, his voice light.

“Maybe.” She replied, a small smile lifting the corners of her mouth. “Maybe.”

* * *

“Where did you end up last night?” Pepper asked in the morning as she poured coffee for both of them. (Oh, how Tony _loved coffee_.) “You were gone for awhile.”

“Wandered around a bit, couldn’t sleep.” Tony paused as he stirred the scrambled eggs in the pan. “Talked to Natasha for a bit, actually.”

“Oh yeah?” He could hear the curiosity in Pepper’s voice, and the edge of protectiveness that he was pretty sure would never go away.

“Yeah. Talked about Bruce, how we miss him. Hope he finds his way back.”

“Hmm. That sounds nice.”

“It was. It was… it was real.”

Pepper definitely looked pleased at that, and once they were settled at the island counter with their breakfast she leaned against Tony a little. “So it’s going okay? With all of them?”

“Yeah. I think so.”

“They’re treating you okay?”

He could hear the persistent concern in her voice, and loved her for caring. “They’re… soft with me, I guess. I don’t know how else to put it.”

Pepper just smiled at him. “I’m glad they are. You deserve it.”

“I… I do… don’t I?” He couldn’t help the uncertain tone in his voice, but Pepper just squeezed his knee and kissed him.

“You’re right. You do.”


	31. A Long-Awaited Apology

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony finally gets the apology deserves.

A month after Tony had gotten his body back to normal, he came back from spending the day in the city for SI business and found Steve waiting for him in the garage.

“Hey, Tony.” Steve smiled and waved as he got out of the car. “How did the meeting go?”

Tony shrugged, still a little taken aback at the friendly chitchat, even though it had already been a month. “It was alright. Board meeting, R&D meeting, budget meeting. I was ready to cry by lunchtime, but I made it. What’s up?” Surely Steve hadn’t been lurking in the garage for who knew how long just to ask about Tony’s day?

“I was wondering… can I talk to you?”

Tony had an automatic _nobadno_ reaction to that, but he was able to keep a handle on it. “Yeah, sure. Here, or inside?”

Steve shifted on his feet, and Tony became aware that he looked incredibly nervous, which was not a look that was commonly found on Steve Rogers. “Here is good. Um…”

A few awkward moments of silence passed, and Tony started to worry.

“Is everything okay?”

Steve took a deep breath (and nearly split the seams of his shirt with those improbably broad shoulders, good gracious), obviously steadying himself.

“I just… I need to say this. Because I haven’t yet. Not really.”

Tony just looked at him, completely confused, and he wasn’t prepared for what Steve said next, his voice aching with both sincerity and sadness.

“Tony, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” 

He blinked several times, flabbergasted. “For what?”

“For Siberia. For Leipzig, for the Accords. For Ultron. For… every single time I looked at you after I found out about Bucky and your parents and didn’t tell you.”

Tony was… not prepared for this. Not at all. He was so stunned he couldn’t even talk, he just stared at Steve with his mouth slightly open. The guy wasn’t done, he just kept talking, like now that he’d gotten going, he couldn’t stop.

“I should have told you the moment I found out. I should have trusted you to help me, I should have _known_ that you’d help me get Bucky back safe. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you. I’m sorry I lied to you. I was wrong, and I’m sorry.”

Until that moment, Tony hadn’t had any idea how much he’d needed to hear those words.

Steve cleared his throat, his voice slightly rough. “I’m sorry that I said Ultron was your fault. Because it wasn’t. There were a lot of hands in on that mess, but you have been the only one to take the blame. I’m sorry I let that happen. I was wrong.”

Tony felt like he couldn’t breathe, but Steve still didn't stop.

“I’m sorry that I assumed the worst when you agreed with the Accords. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to reason. If I had been honest with you about Bucky from the beginning, that never would’ve happened. I hope. I know you were doing everything you could to protect us, to keep us together. I’m sorry I didn’t see that. I should have. I was wrong.”

A quick breath then, like Steve was bracing himself. “I’m sorry about the fight at the airport. It never should have gotten to that point. When I think about it, about the way we all fought each other like that, it makes me sick. We hurt each other, because of the truth I hid. Rhodey… Rhodey was paralyzed because I asked Clint, Sam, Wanda, Bucky, and Scott to fight my battle, illegally, knowing what would happen if we lost. I was… so far beyond wrong to do that. And I’m so sorry.”

“It was an accident,” Tony rasped, barely able to get the words out. “Rhodey, it was an accident, nobody meant—”

“It happened because of me. Clint, Wanda, Sam, and Scott went to the Raft because of me. It was my fault. And I will be apologizing to every single one of them, but… I needed to apologize to you first.”

“Steve, I—”

“I’m sorry for Siberia. I can’t… Tony, I can’t believe what I did.” Steve looked down at his hands, and they shook slightly. “The only reason all that happened, that Zemo was able to do that to us, was because of me. One tiny, glaring omission that never should have been made, and I ruined our friendship, our team.” 

He looked back up, and there were tears in his eyes. “Tony, I nearly _killed you_. Bucky and I beat you half to hell, and then I nearly killed you with my own two hands. I thought about it. I looked down at your face, and I knew all it would take was one… one blow. And it would all be over. Nobody would even know. I can’t believe that I even for one second thought about it.” 

Steve buried his face in his hands for a moment, and though Tony’s mouth worked, he couldn’t seem to speak, nothing came out. Then Steve was talking again. 

“And then I just left you there. In a broken suit that couldn’t fly. All I cared about was getting Bucky somewhere safe, I didn’t even think about anything else. But I left you there, all alone, without any way to get to safety. You could have died there. You could have frozen to death, and nobody would have even known where you were. You might have died, and Pepper never would have known what happened to you. Because I left you there. _I_ left you there.”

Okay, he could not… Tony could not handle any more. “Steve… Steve please. It’s… it’s enough. It’s enough now.”

Steve swallowed hard and wiped his eyes on the back of his wrist. “I know I don’t deserve to ask for your forgiveness. I can’t forgive myself. I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am. How wrong I was. I should have said it a long time ago. I’m so sorry, Tony. I’m so sorry.”

“Steve…” Leaning forward, Tony impulsively gave his… friend… a quick, hard hug. “I—”

Steve shuddered a little and shook his head. “Please don’t say anything. Especially not if you’re gonna say it’s okay. Because it’s not. Both of us are… a little too raw right now, so let’s just… table anything else ‘til later. Okay? And maybe… then maybe we can try the whole friends thing again. The right way this time. Maybe.”

Tony nodded. That was a good idea, he could do that. “Yeah. Okay.”

Steve shuffled his feet again, and the heaviness of the conversation lifted though his eyes were still red. He smiled a little, looking kind of bashful now, and not like he was carrying a heavy burden. “Thanks, Tony. For… everything.”

“Yep,” Tony replied, shoving his hands into his pockets. “No problem.”

Steve paused, looking at him. “I mean it. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Tony finally said after a pause, sounding awkward.

Steve just smiled, reached out slow enough that Tony wouldn’t be startled by it or could back away if he wanted to, and gently clasped his shoulder. Then he turned around and left, before things got uncomfortable, apparently happy to let little baby steps be enough.

As he watched Steve go, still feeling a little off-balance at how different everything was, Tony tapped his fingers against his thigh inside his pocket absentmindedly.

It was still weird. All of it, especially with Steve. They were all trying so hard, making an effort every single day, so much so that it was exhausting just to watch.

But… it was getting better. Slowly, almost painfully at times, but it was getting better. Silences weren’t as common or as long, conversations weren’t so stilted, and a few times it had even felt like it had been before. For that short time after Loki and before Ultron, when they had been something like friends. Just better.

Mulling it over in his mind, Tony headed inside, unaware of the small smile on his face. 

Friends. He liked that idea.


	32. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Science Bro returns...

Of all the ways Tony could have imagined it happening, the return of his amazing friend and Science Bro, this had not cropped up even in his wildest dreams.

“So,” Bruce said as he strolled off a bright blue and orange spaceship and onto the lawn behind the Compound. “You’ve probably got some questions.”

Tony, who had been staring slack-jawed at his Science Bro (and the _spaceship_ and the _ALIENS_ ), was abruptly yanked out of his momentary stunned silence. He stormed towards Bruce, probably looking slightly terrifying, if Bruce’s apprehensive expression was anything to go by, and then he was throwing his arms around the guy and hugging him as tight as possible.

Bruce wheezed a little, then hugged him back. “Missed you too, Tony.”

“That's my shirt. I've been looking for that. And I definitely have so many questions.” He muttered, and he could feel Bruce laugh against his chest.

“Plenty of time for that. But first, I’ve got some bad news.”

Tony groaned, but loosened his hold and stepped back. “I hate bad news.”

“Yeah, but at least I brought reinforcements with me? We’re gonna need them.” Bruce turned and pointed to each of them as he said their names. “Loki you already know, and that’s Valkyrie. Peter Quill, Gamora, Nebula, Drax, Mantis, Rocket, and Groot.”

Tony looked again at the aliens that had disembarked the ship. A few were human, one he of course recognized as Loki, and wasn’t that an interesting turn of events (wasn’t he supposed to be dead?!). There was also a woman with green skin, another with blue skin and some metal parts, a huge, muscly man with gray skin that looked engraved with red markings, another woman with freakishly huge eyes and a pair of antenna sticking out of her head. And… a raccoon. Carrying a gun. Standing next to a tree with eyeballs.

_WTF…_

“So very many questions…”

“Yeah, I know. You gonna invite me in? Got a lot to tell you, and then we’ll probably wanna pull the team together.” Bruce paused, then looked worried. “We still… have a team, right?”

A few months ago, that would have been a really painful thing to hear. But now…

Tony actually smiled. “We do. Plus a few extras, so that’ll be good. Gimme a hint, what kind of intergalactic superdoom are we facing this time?”

“Thanos.” Bruce replied, and the word seemed to shiver right into Tony’s soul. He didn’t know how, but he _knew_. This was what he’d been afraid of, what he’d been so terrified of before Ultron. What he’d known was coming, all these years.

“I knew it.” He whispered, feeling the hair rise up on his arms and the back of his neck. “I knew something big was coming.”

“And you were right. But I think… we just might beat him. We’ve got some inside information, and you wouldn’t believe what these guys have done.” He looked back at the assortment of people and aliens behind him. “They’re a good group.”

“Guess we’ll add them to our collection,” Tony said with a smile, trying to shake off his case of heebie-jeebies as he gestured for everyone to follow him. “Let’s all go inside and we’ll introduce everyone.”

“They’re all here, right?” Bruce asked, falling into step with Tony, their arms coming up around each other’s shoulders. “I saw that the Tower wasn’t home anymore, but you made it easy for me to find this place. You do that on purpose?” He grinned.

“Sure did. Kept hoping my lost Science Bro would find his way home.”

“I did. And we’ve got this, Tony. I know we do. Things are gonna be okay.”

“You know what,” Tony replied thoughtfully, “I think they just might be. Long as we’re all together… it just might be.”

And he was right. They were.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the reformed Avengers and Co. in collaboration with a few Asgardians and the Guardians of the Galaxy defeat Thanos the first time around...
> 
> WE HAVE REACHED THE END, MY DARLINGS! Thank you so much for coming on this wild ride with me. I'm adding a bonus chapter just for the ABSOLUTELY SPECTACULAR ART that Nat made for this fic, and [here's the link to her Tumblr post](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com) . Please go give her some love, she deserves it for all the amazing work she did.
> 
> *Blows kisses*


	33. ART FOR THE FIC!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All of this marvelous art was done by Nat / [hereandnowwearealive](https://hereandnowwearealive.tumblr.com/) / [Sadekuuro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadekuuro), who is a completely amazing artist and who I will never be grateful enough to!

[Art from Chapter 6: Very Familiar Eyes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60177898)

Looking relieved, Tony nodded, giving her hand a squeeze before letting Rhodey take his other hand and lead him over to Happy. They went inside together, gathering in Tony and Pepper’s living room, and it only took a minute for Tony to become enthralled with a game FRIDAY had sent to Happy’s StarkPad. He sat contentedly on Happy’s lap on the couch and glanced up every so often to make sure Pepper and Rhodey were still in the kitchen just across the room.

[ ](http://imgbox.com/I0LwKZQo)

* * *

[Art from Chapter 9: Hidden Depths of Fear](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60196558)

Pepper rested a hand on the top of Tony’s head, lightly ruffling the loose dark curls as he shifted further behind her leg. “Do you remember them, Tony?”

He nodded, but didn’t otherwise move, watching the Avengers with one wide eye peeking around her leg.

[](http://imgbox.com/QwrSGgiY)

* * *

[FULL COLOR ART from Chapter 10: Uncomfortable Aftermath](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60213256)

Rain was pouring down in thick sheets, pattering onto the wet grass and concrete, and Tony was right out there in it, wearing brand new bright red rain boots. He was jumping in puddles with all the happiness and enthusiasm of a child, giggling when he got a particularly big splash. He waved back at Pepper, the hood and shoulders of his jacket soaked from the rain, but if he was cold, he didn’t seem to mind.

[](http://imgbox.com/IpeDFqSJ)

* * *

[Art from Chapter 12: Perspective and Platypuses](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60251053)

He was wearing the white button-down shirt that he said was to match her, and some black skinny jeans… and a pair of Pepper’s high heels. Slipping and tottering and clunking around, he shuffled his way to the door of the closet, arms out for balance and giggling.

[](http://imgbox.com/CPJmhrC7)

ALSO FROM CHAPTER 12, NOW IN FULL COLOR!

Tony was giggling even harder, comparing the two different sets of robot socks before picking up the next one, green with lumpy brown shapes. “What are these ones, Wo-dey?”

Rhodey grinned. “Those are platypuses.”

Giggling so hard the pile of socks were starting to fall off his lap, Tony started tugging at the platypus socks, trying to separate them. “I wanna put them on!”

“Here, hold on, they’ve got one of those plastic things.” Rhodey pulled his keys out of his pocket and used the tiny scissors on his keychain pocket knife to cut the plastic security tag, and watched as Tony jammed his feet into the socks.

[](http://imgbox.com/WsG6oufo)

* * *

[Art for Chapter 16: Various Types of Friendships](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60298981)

That evening, Happy and Tony sat side by side on the bench on Tony and Pepper’s patio, eating cheeseburgers as they watched the sun go down. Tony’s feet, clad in tiny black loafers that matched his black suit, swung back and forth a little as he ate a burger nearly the size of his head.

[](http://imgbox.com/cPWusy1x)

Also from Chapter 16!

The bots rolled out of their charging stations to meet him halfway, curiously looking at the bot and poking at it gently with their claws. Tony stood up on tiptoe so they could see it, demonstrating how the lights would blink when he pushed the heart-shaped button on the front.

[](http://imgbox.com/GI85PJBM)

* * *

[Art for Chapter 20: A Breakthrough](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60367405)

He couldn’t do anything but stare, watching as the fickle thing hovered over Tony, as if it were looking down at the kid. Tony was sitting on the floor with a notebook and pencil in his hands, leaning against Dum-E’s base as the bot chirped at him. The kid's went wide as he stared up at the Cloak, nervousness clear on his face.

[](http://imgbox.com/bcz5Tyfo)

FULL COLOR ART ALSO FROM CHAPTER 20!

And then with a graceful whirl that made Tony startle, the Cloak repositioned itself and settled around the boy’s small shoulders, wrapping around him like a blanket. And then, after a moment of stillness, it nudged at Tony’s hand, indicating for him to continue.

A slow smile spread on Tony’s little face, delight taking over his features as he gently patted the folds of the Cloak. It seemed to snug just a bit closer around him, cuddling Tony within its depths, ruffling the loose curls on his head with the ends of the tall collar. Tony giggled, batting the interfering cloth away from his hair, then smiled to himself as he continued what he was doing in his notebook. Dum-E gave another beep, then clumsily patted at the Cloak with his claw, apparently giving his approval.

[](http://imgbox.com/o3N5QRwU)

* * *

[Art from Chapter 22: The Amazing Spider-Boy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24855205/chapters/60368692)

Peter kept his suit with him at all times, and he pulled it out of his backpack while Tony kicked off his shoes. He shimmied into the Spiderman suit eagerly, his whole face lit up with joy. The legs were far too long, bunching around his ankles while the toes went beyond his feet. The arms likewise bunched at the elbows and wrists, but Tony looked so pleased as he struck a heroic pose that Peter couldn’t help but applaud.

[](http://imgbox.com/vpxtgCaK)

“You look amazing! The Amazing Spider-Boy!”

Tony couldn’t seem to help the little excited wiggle he did, looking down at himself as he grinned. “It’s too big.”

Peter was experiencing I can’t even levels of cuteness overload as he snapped a couple pictures on his phone. “That’s okay, it looks great anyway. Hey! You should try the web shooters! To get the full experience.”

[](http://imgbox.com/v4x8qfzr)

* * *

NAT, YOU ARE AMAZING!


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